CHENGDU -- The earthquake-hit Chinese province has decided to halt the sports events in May and June, moving out a world men's volleyball league tournament.
Sichuan, devastated by a 8.0-magnitude quake on May 12, has cancelled all of its international and domestic sports events scheduled for May and June, said Sichuan sports chief Zhu Ling on Wednesday.
Zhu, a former member of the Chinese women's volleyball team, said the annual world men's volleyball league, which Chengdu has hosted twice, will be moved to the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou.
"We have put a lot of money in the volleyball tournament," said Chen Rong, an organizer of the Chengdu event. "The earthquake wiped it out."
Zhou Jian'an, Sichuan-born head coach of the Chinese men's volleyball team, said his team will put up "a good performance" in Hangzhou to solace the quake survivors.
"I won't let my folks down," he said.
China will take on Japan, Poland and Eygpt in the June 14-29 tournament.
The Chinese Boxing Championships, which went into the second day of competition in Leshan city, 140 kilometers south of the provincial capital Chengdu, as the disaster hit Sichuan, was cancelled and the pugilists were evacuated.
Sports infrastructure in Sichuan has been seriously damaged in the earthquake, Zhu Ling said.
A newly-built gymnasium, a swimming pool and a stadium in the Aba Normal Institute in Wenchuan, the epicenter of China's most deadly quake in decades, were all wiped out and a 3,000-seat gymnasium in Jiangyou city, which was jolted by a 6.0-magnitude aftershock on Sunday, had been devastated by the May 12 quake.
The Sichuan Sports Bureau closed all the sports venues and facilities on the day of the earthquake, said Zhu.
Although none of Sichuan-based athletes was killed or injured in the massive earthquake, some athletes lost their beloved ones and saw their homes ruined in the disaster, according to Zhu.
Zhang Rongwei, principal of the Sichuan Sports Institute, told Xinhua Wednesday morning that the Zhang Shan Training Center, which is named after the Sichuan-born Olympic shooting champion, and the Land Sports Training School in the northern suburb of Chengdu, have been declared "hazardous buildings".
Also on the list of "hazardous buildings" are two dormitory buildings of the Sichuan Sports Institute.
Twenty Olympics-bound athletes, including Asian Games hurdles champion Liu Jing, were training in Sichuan when the disaster hit the province historically named as "A Land of Abundance". "They are all safe," said Director Zhu.
Sichuan has churned out a dozen Olympic champions including Chen Longcan (table tennis), Gao Min (diving), Zhang Shan (shooting) and Du Li (shooting) and Tang Lin (judo).
When the earthquake rocked Sichuan, Asian Football Confederation president Hohamed Bin Hammam and Chinese soccer boss Xie Yalong were attending a soccer forum in a Chengdu hotel.
Hamman and Xie looked composed when reporters fled. They were among the last group of the forum attendees evacuated to the Chengdu Sports Center.
The death toll from the devastating earthquake was 40,075 nationwide as of 6 p.m. on Tuesday, according to the Information Office of the State Council. Another 247,645 people were injured and 32,361 people were missing as of Tuesday at noon.
