It has been claimed the Prime Minister is prepared to offer Zimbabwe a deal that if they accept a compromise that would prevent its cricket team from competing in England next year, when they are due to tour here and England is schedule to host the Twenty20 World Cup, then they would not stop them from participating in the 2012 Olympics.

 

But the Government do not have that power because the responsibility of whether a country is invited to compete or not in 2012 rests with the International Olympic Committee.

 

“The IOC issues invitations to the National Olympic Committees,” a spokeswoman for the IOC told The Observer in an article published today.

 

In 2000 the IOC demanded an explanation from the Australian Government after it denied entry to two senior Olympic officials accredited to the Sydney Games, one of who had alleged links with the Russian mafia and the Central Asian drugs trade. Gafur Rakhimov, of Uzbekistan, who was a senior executive of the International Amateur Boxing Association, and an unnamed member of the Hong Kong Olympic Committee from attending the Games, were both barred.

 

Zimbabwe has competed in every Olympics since 1980, where their women’s hockey team surprisingly won the gold medal.

 

At the 2004 Games in Athens swimmer Kirsty Coventry, part of the country's 30,000-minority white population, claimed three medals, including gold in the 200 metre backstroke, receiving a heroine’s welcome upon her return to Harare.

 

Previously Rhodesia had made its Olympic debut at Amsterdam in 1928 but was prevented from competing after 1972 following Ian Smith's declaration of Rhodesia's independence from Britain.

 

The suspension was lifted following the election of Robert Mugabe as president of Zimbabwe.

 

The IOC took the original decision in the face of mounting threats from African countries that they would boycott the Munich Olympics if they were not banned.

 

The fear for London organisers is that if Brown is seen as being heavy-handed with Zimbabwe there could be another such threat in London in 2012.

 

The threat that England would withdraw from a one-day tour of Zimbabwe in 2004 led to fear among officials leading London’s Olympic bid that it would alienate potential African voters and give Paris the opportunity to seize the Games. In the end it needed some careful diplomacy from London 2012 chairman Sebastian Coe to ensure that the subject was ultimately not a major issue.

 

Coe will be determined that an international political row will not be allowed to overshadow London in 2012.

 

He is a revered figure within the Olympic movement partly because of his refusal to heed calls from Margaret Thatcher to boycott the 1980 Games in Moscow over the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.

 

He went on there to win the first of his two Olympic 1500 metre titles.

 

A spokeswoman for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), the lead Government department on the Olympics, admitted last night they could do nothing to prevent Zimbabwe competing in 2012.

 

“London's host city contract with the International Olympic Committee makes it clear that all National Olympic Committees recognised by the IOC are entitled to participate in the 2012 Games,” spokeswoman for the DCMS told The Observer.

 

“The Government remains fully committed to the terms of this contract and to the Games' spirit of inclusiveness.

 

That is not - and will never be - in doubt.”

 

The full article can be read at http://sport.guardian.co.uk/london2012/story/0,,2236220,00.html.