Switzerland

Australia, which hosts the next Olympic Games in the year 2000, said it wanted to jail drug pushers - rather than athletes - with its controversial proposal for criminalising doping in sport.

President of the International Olympic Committe Juan Antonio Samaranch has decided to convene an extraordinary session of the IOC in March.

An Olympic Games corruption-buster will be recruited to supervise Olympic delegates and bid cities in the wake of this year's vote-buying scandal, according to Australian newspaper reports.

Sporting events across Europe are under threat as fears about the foot-and-mouth outbreak in Britain spread to the continent.

Austrian and Swiss soccer federation officials met in Vienna on Tuesday to discuss a possible joint bid to hold the 2008 European championship finals.

German former tennis ace Boris Becker said he planned a stock exchange listing for one of his marketing companies next year.

The chief executive officer of South Africa's bid committee for the 2006 Soccer World Cup has told the South African Cabinet that he is extremly confident the country will be awarded the event, the Pan African News Agency reports.

IOC President Samaranch said Wednesday he hopes the proposed Olympic anti-drug agency could be up and running by the end of next year.

A report on the Salt Lake City 2002 Winter Olympics bribery scandal has recommended disciplinary action including expulsion for up to 16 International Olympic Committee (IOC) members, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Nasdaq-listed Quokka Sports have announced the addition of four new members to its executive team.

Formula One champion Michael Schumacher heads the American Forbes Magazine's list of the highest paid athletes for the year 2000 with US$59m in earnings.

Member federations of the International Olympic Committee(IOC) have been commenting on the issues raised by the IOC World Conference on Sports and New Media in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis has said that preparations for the 2004 Athens Olympics were in a "state of emergency" following International Olympic Committee (IOC) warnings in April.

Credit Suisse Group has said it would no longer sponsor the Tour of Switzerland or the Swiss team because of the sport's declining popularity following a spate of doping scandals.

The IOC has annunced an autumn programme of evaluation visits to cities hoping to stage the 2006 Winter Olympics.

South Korean President Kim Dae-jung has said he hoped an International Olympic Committee initiative to host sports ties between North and South Korea would eventually lead to joint Korean teams for international competitions.