TURIN, Italy: A thumbs-up from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and an approved budget have given organizers of the Winter Games in Turin a welcome boost just 23 days before the start of the competition.

A runner carries the Olympic torch in a gondola along the Canal Grande in Venice January 17, 2006. About 10,000 torchbearers will take the flame on an 11,000-km (6,835-mile) trek to 140 cities before the 2006 Winter Olympics in the northern Italian city of Turin. [Reuters]

The organizing committee (TOROC) has had to contend with complaints about a lack of snow and a perceived lack of public interest as well as with concerns over the financing of the Games.

"All the venues are ready, the situation has improved greatly since the last visit by the FIS," said an upbeat Gilbert Felli, IOC Executive Director for the Olympic Winter Games, after an on-site inspection over the weekend.

Felli made the comments from Sestriere after accusations by the International Ski Federation about the lack of snow in the main alpine skiing site.

Helmuth Schmalzl, FIS head of safety for the downhills, did a reconnaissance of the Olympic slopes on January 7 and reported on the lack of snow in the high part of the men's downhill and the risk of danger in the ski lift area because of the lack of snow cover.

But Felli, an ex-racer in the Swiss national ski team, retorted: "The start is fine, the snow cannons have blasted a good snow covering.

"I would say that everything has been sorted out and that (when) this week Schmalzl goes back and checks the track, I am convinced that he will find everything in order.

"With less than a month from the start of the Olympic Winter Games, I am very satisfied.

"There are some small details to define, but the only thing I will need to do during my next visits to the venues is to congratulate the people in charge for having done an excellent job."

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