The 49th ISU Ordinary Congress opened on 3 June in Kyoto, Japan. In attendance were over 190 delegates from almost 50 countries, including five current skaters. In his address the ISU President, Mr Ottavio Cinquanta, thanked the Japan Skating Federation for their support in hosting the Congress, which is being held in Asia for the first time.

Mr Cinquanta stressed the importance of both development and consolidation. The ISU Development Program has distributed over 13 million Swiss Francs in the previous two years and some 85% of all ISU income continues to be re-invested directly in skating sports. Following the crisis in Salt Lake City it was necessary to consolidate and maintain unity within the organization. ISU sports play a key role in the Olympic Winter Games and attract considerable public and media interest.

The Congress began debating some 500 proposals for changes to the regulations and agreed a key revision to Article 19 of the Constitution about the functions of the five Technical Committees (Figure Skating, Ice Dance, Speed Skating, Short Track Speed Skating and Synchronized Skating).

Paragraph 3 (b) of Article 19 now reads:

(The functions of the Committees include) "the drawing up of the lists of Referees, Judges, Starters and Competitors Stewards based on the initial nominations from Members and based on re-nominations decided by the respective Technical Committee, subject to Council confirmation."

Mr Cinquanta introduced an urgent proposal regarding a new Judging System for Figure Skating, which had received the unanimous support of the Council. It was important that such a significant proposal for the ISU should be debated by the whole Congress. All delegates agreed on the need for improvement to the current Judging System.

The Congress accepted the proposal for a team of experts to work on a project to develop a new Judging System for figure skating. The Figure Skating Section of the Congress would debate the project and also proposals received from the United States Figure Skating Association and Ice Skating Australia.

The Judging System based on the basic criteria out-lined in the ISU Press Release of 28 May 2002 entitled "ISU Proposal for a New Judging System" may be used for test purposes at international events.

For further information please contact:

Rowland Jack - Communications Coordinator

E-mail jack@isu.ch
Mobile +81 90 4023 3222

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