Baseball and Softball have made another small step towards the return to the Olympic Programme. On Monday the organizing committee of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics announced eight shortlisted federations, which have been invited to participate in phase two of the process to identify one or more additional sports to the 2020 Olympics. Further details need to be submitted by July 22, one-to-one interviews will be held on August 7 and 8. In September the organizers of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics will decide which sports they want to have on the program. The final decision will be made by the IOC at its 129th session in Rio in August 2016.
The eight shortlisted IFs are (sport alphabetical order):
1. World Baseball Softball Confederation – WBSC
2. World Bowling – WB
3. World Karate Federation – WKF
4. International Roller Sports Federation – FIRS
5. International Federation of Sport Climbing – IFSC
6. World Squash Federation – WSF
7. International Surfing Association – ISA
8. International Wushu Federation – IWUF