Japan and the Korea Republic get ready for the 2002 World cup
JAPAN and the KOREA REPUBLIC, co-organisers of the next World Cup in 2002, would like to see the next competition played under the banner of “peace and fraternity”. This was the message sent out by the two delegations, together for the first time for a lunch at the Méridien hotel in PARIS.
“It will be Asia’s first World Cup finals. We want it to be a great competition and a marvellous celebration for all Asian people,” said Dr CHUNG MONG JOON, President of the Korean Football Federation and Vice President of FIFA. “It’ll be the first World Cup of the 21st century. It represents an enormous challenge for us and we have already begun thinking about how the competition is to be organised,” said Hiroshi USHIJIMA, the General Secretary of the Japanese Organising Committee.
Surrounded by diplomats and politicians from their respective countries, the representatives from the two organising committees were anxious to stress their willingness to work together to make the 2002 World Cup a success. “Even though the two countries are neighbours, JAPAN and the KOREA REPUBLIC have many differences, notably in terms of language”, said Hiroshi USHIJIMA. “Personally I see this project as a great responsibility. But the 1998 World Cup has allowed me to learn a great deal about how to go about organising a large-scale event. I have been very impressed by the professionalism in FRANCE, and above all by the hospitality. At all the venues where I have followed the JAPAN team, we have been received with words of welcome in Japanese. It is an experience from which I will draw considerable inspiration.