11:16,

YEREVAN, JUNE 28, ARMENPRESS. United World Wrestling (UWW) on Tuesday announced the hosts for the 2024 Paris Olympic qualifiers. The Pan-American Olympic Games Qualifier will kick off the qualifying cycle next year. The first continental qualifier will be hosted in Acapulco, Mexico. The tournament will be preceded by the Pan-American Championships which will be held at the same venue. Next, the African & Oceania Olympic Games Qualifier will be held in Cairo, Egypt followed by the European Olympic Games Qualifier which will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Shortly after the announcement of the venues, the Armenian Wrestling Federation told ARMENPRESS that it still has no final decision on participation in the Baku qualifiers.

Secretary General of the Wrestling Federation of Armenia, Arayik Baghdadyan, told ARMENPRESS that teams opting out from the Baku qualifier would subsequently be disqualified from the next qualifier in Istanbul. You opt out from one tournament you automatically lose the chance of participating in the next one, he said.

However, the final decision whether or not Armenia will participate in the Baku qualifier will be made jointly by the federation, the ministry of sports and the National Olympic Committee.

“It’s not just up to the federation to decide whether or not to participate. If we don’t participate in the Baku tournament we lose the right to participate in the Istanbul world qualifier,” Baghdadyan said.

He added that a discussion will take place between the federation, the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport and the National Olympic Committee.

Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan will witness the Asian Olympic Games Qualifier preceded by the Asian Championships at the same venue.

The final tournament that offers quotas for the Paris Games, known as the World Olympic Qualifier, will take place in Istanbul, Turkiye.

The qualifying events for the Paris Games begin with the 2023 World Championships in Belgrade, Serbia, scheduled for September and it will offer 90 quotas, five in each Olympic weight class.

Each of the four continental qualifiers will offer 36 quotas, totaling 144 quotas. The World Olympic Qualifier, to be held in Istanbul, will have 54 places available for the 2024 Olympic Games.

The dates for the four continental Olympic Games qualifiers and the World Olympic Games Qualifier will be announced at a later stage.