Logo for Tokyo 2020 Olympics abandoned

In July plans for the Olympic stadium were also scrapped amid growing concerns over costs.

Since Sano first unveiled the now-abandoned Olympic designs, other allegations have been leveled against the designer.

“We’ve judged it is appropriate to withdraw the emblems and begin developing new ones in order to resolve the current situation”, Toshiro Muto, director general of the committee, said at a hastily arranged press conference Tuesday night. A lawmaker, who came to know about the decision to scrap the logo through news reports during a meeting of the panel of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party which was hearing explanations about the issues involving the new national stadium, angrily said, “No surprise”.

In recent days, Olympic sponsors including carrier Japan Airlines have started using the logo in their advertising campaigns.

Since pulling the artwork, Sano has apologized to some parties, but not for his work on the logo.

Belgian designer Olivier Debie has sued the worldwide Olympic Committee to halt the use of the logo created by Kenjiro Sano, a Japanese designer. ‘At this point, we have decided that the logo can not gain public support’.

The IOC has rejected the claims and Japanese officials again on Friday said Sano’s work was original and they had no plans to change it.

However, it was later pointed out that the official emblem for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics resembles the logo for Theatre de Liege.

“I feel betrayed”, he added.

“Nobody can deny that the reputation of the logo has been tarnished”, Tokyo governor Yoichi Masuzoe said before the logo was dropped, according to Reuters.

Mr Sano subsequently acknowledged eight of the 30 designs used for a brewery’s promotional tote bags included copies of others’ works but, in that case, he blamed assistants saying they had “traced” the images and apologising for the oversight.

Moving forward, the Olympic organizing committee will hold a competition for a new logo.

The committee said Sano requested the emblem be pulled, and that he is unpaid for the design.

For the second time this summer, Tokyo Olympics staffers set about scrubbing the Internet and social media of images that had promised to serve as a key emblem of the 2020 Games. In June, the initial design of the main stadium was scrapped following public outrage over skyrocketing costs.