The 17-year-old swimmer qualified for the event on the basis of his strong performances at the Sarajevo Championships this year

Young Qatari swimmer Yaqoub al-Khulaifi has been given the honour of carrying the Qatari flag during the opening ceremony of the Youth Olympic Games here today. The 17-year-old qualified for the event on the basis of his strong performances at the Sarajevo International Swimming Championships in Bosnia and Herzegovina this year where he won the 50m butterfly gold and a silver in the 200m freestyle. He also clocked good times during the recent FINA World Cup in Doha.
Over 4,000 athletes from 206 National Olympic Committees are competing in the Youth Olympic Games being held for the third time.
Athletes representing Qatar are hurdler Awab Baro, discus thrower Ahmed al-Haj, swimmers Abdul Aziz Mohamed and Yacoub al-Khulaifi and Equestrian Mohamed al-Kashouti. In the previous participation in China, 23 athletes represented Qatar in handball, equestrian, shooting, swimming, table tennis as well as athletics. The first edition of the Games, which was held in Singapore eight years ago, saw the participation of six Qatari athletes.
Meanwhile, Argentina said it will consider a possible Olympic Games bid after completing the Youth Olympics starting in Buenos Aires, president Mauricio Macri said.
Macri, speaking at the start of an Olympic forum in the Argentine capital, said the Buenos Aires Youth Games had introduced innovations that could be implemented in other events.
The Youth Olympics are an International Olympic Committee (IOC) event and are a scaled down version of the Games, organised every four years for young athletes. “Obviously once this wonderful event is finished we will have the chance to start thinking about trying to organise Olympic Games,” Macri said. “It is obviously much more difficult.”
Seated next to IOC President Thomas Bach, Macri said the country’s current economic situation had forced organisers to find cost-effective solutions for the Youth Games.
“At a time when we are committed to reduce poverty, organising such an event of money is no longer so easy. These innovations will help to add another value,” Macri said. Argentina is struggling to break free from cyclical financial crises that have hit the country every decade over the past 60 years.
A $57 billion International Monetary Fund standby financing deal, upgraded from an original $50 billion, includes sharper spending cuts and tax hikes aimed at wiping out the country’s primary fiscal deficit, which is expected to equal 2.6 percent of gross domestic product this year. “In this moment in which we live with a lot of tensions and the need to build new bridges, sports has a unique power to build bridges more solidly than those of steel,” Macri said.
Brazilian city Rio de Janeiro hosted the first South American Olympic Games in 2016. The 2024 Olympics will be hosted by Paris while Los Angeles will stage the 2028 edition.