Bach leads ceremony for Munich victims
IOC president Thomas Bach has led a mourning ceremony for the 11 Israeli athletes and coaches slain at the 1972 Munich Olympics, a tribute that a widow of the one of the victims says brings "closure for us".
Bach read out the names of each of the 11 Israelis who died after the raid by Palestinian gunmen in the athletes' village in Munich.
He then led a minute's silence during Wednesday's inauguration of a "place of mourning" in the athletes' village in Rio de Janeiro.
With two widows of the Israeli victims and several current Israeli team members looking on, Bach said the Munich massacre "was an attack not only on our fellow Olympians but also an assault on the values that the Olympic Village stands for".
After his remarks, an emotional Bach hugged Ankie Spitzer and Ilana Romano, the widows of fencing coach Andre Spitzer and weightlifter Yossef Romano.
Families of the Munich victims have campaigned for years for the International Olympic Committee to give special recognition to the Israeli dead.
Ankie Spitzer said: "We waited for this for 44 years, to have this remembrance and recognition of our loves ones.
"This is closure for us," she added.
Bach also read out of the name of Nodar Kumaritashvili, the Georgian luger killed in a training crash on the eve of the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver.
