IOC creates panel to review female issues in Olympic sports

The names of experts appointed to an Olympic panel looking at female gender issues ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics are not being revealed, the IOC said on Friday.

A working group on "Protection of the Female Category" in sports was promised by the International Olympic Committee's first female president Kirsty Coventry when she was elected in March.

A key campaign theme was the IOC taking more strategy-setting responsibility in fallout from the furor around women's boxing at the Paris Summer Games that was widely used then and since as a culture war issue, including by U.S. President Donald Trump.

The governing bodies of boxing and track and field now require female athletes to take sex tests, and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee in July effectively banned transgender women from Olympic sports to comply with an executive order by the Trump administration.

"The names of the members of the working group will remain confidential for now to protect the integrity of the group and their work," the IOC said in a statement.

The female protection panel was announced on Friday among four expert groups — the others are reviewing Olympic sports programs and calendars, commercial issues, and the Youth Olympics — but the only one in which the list of members was kept secret.

No timetable was given for the panels' work which is intended to start "as soon as possible," the IOC body said, under the project banner "Fit for the future."

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The panel for Olympic sports will look at the global calendar at a time of changing climate and a widespread expectation the 2036 Summer Games will move from the traditional July-August slot.

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