Tokyo 2020 CEO Toshiro Muto welcomed Thursday’s decision by the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan to remove a logo from its website that Olympic organizers had deemed “offensive.” Speaking to reporters in an online news conference Thursday, Muto said organizers immediately reached out to the FCCJ upon hearing of the satirical logo, which is featured on the cover of the April issue of the club’s monthly magazine and depicted an image similar to the Tokyo 2020 logo with “COVID-19” written underneath.
“Last week, we acknowledged the issue at hand when we received an inquiry from a person from the media,” Muto said. “Right after we received this inquiry, our spokesperson (Masa Takaya) contacted the FCCJ and verbally protested what had happened. Then we were asked to submit a document with regards to our protest. So we did.” Takaya clarified it was a member of his team, and not him directly, who contacted the FCCJ.
Muto said organizers, while offended by the logo, also considered it a copyright issue.