Kingdom to participate in Islamic Solidarity Games

Saudi Arabia will participate in the third Islamic Solidarity Games in the Indonesian city of Palembang, which opens Sept. 22 and continues through Oct. 1.
About 5,000 athletes from OIC countries are expected to participate in the games.
“We’ll participate in nine competitions — athletics, archery, basketball, football, karate, taekwondo, tennis, volleyball, and weightlifting — from a total of 13 games,” a statement from the General Presidency of Youth Welfare said.
Draws took place last Wednesday for football, basketball and volleyball in the presence of Muneef Al-Dossary, a senior official at the Youth Welfare Presidency.
Saudi Arabia is bracketed in Group 2 with UAE, Palestine and Turkey in football matches to be held from Sept. 17 to 29, an official statement said.
The Saudi basketball team’s matches with Kuwait, Qatar and Palestine will be held Sept. 15-20. In volleyball matches set for Sept. 23-30 the Saudi team will pit skills against Indonesia, Turkmenistan, Egypt and Libya.
“Our players will participate in athletics scheduled for Sept. 25-29,” the statement said.
The event, which brings together athletes from member countries of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, was originally scheduled to be held in April at Pekanbaru on Sumatra island.
The Islamic Solidarity Games is a multinational, multi-sport event under the aegis of the Islamic Solidarity Games Federation (ISSF). The ISG’s participating countries are Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Bahrain, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Libya, Palestine, Kuwait, Malaysia, Brunei Darussalam, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Oman, Morocco, Uzbekistan, Senegal, Tunisia, Guinea, Congo, Jordan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Somalia.
The First ISG was held in 2005 in Saudi Arabia. The second event was cancelled after it had been originally scheduled to take place in Tehran in October 2009.