IOC and the Japanese government agreed last month to postpone the 2020 Olympics because of the global coronavirus outbreak.

The costs of rearranging the Games and who will pay them have yet to be clarified by either IOC or the Japanese government.

However, on Monday IOC published a Q&A on their website about the postponement and answered the question ‘What will be the financial impact of postponing the Games?’

Part of the answer referred to Abe and has become the bone of contention between the Olympics organising partners.

“Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo agreed that Japan will continue to cover the costs it would have done under the terms of the existing agreement for 2020, and IOC will continue to be responsible for its share of the costs,” read IOC’s answer.

“For IOC, it is already clear that this amounts to several hundred millions of dollars of additional costs.”

On Tuesday, Tokyo 2020 spokesman Masa Takaya said it was “not appropriate for the PM’s name to be quoted in this manner”.

“What we are requesting to IOC team is that the name of the Japanese Prime Minister should not be quoted, plus IOC’s website should not express beyond what was agreed between IOC and Tokyo 2020,” said Takaya.

Later on Tuesday, IOC updated the Q&A section of their website and removed any mention of Abe.

“IOC and the Japanese side, including the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee, will continue to assess and discuss jointly the respective impacts caused by the postponement,” read the updated statement.

Tokyo 2020 said that the breakdown of who will pay the additional costs was not discussed between Abe and IOC President Thomas Bach when the two made the decision to postpone the Games.

Earlier, Kyodo news agency reported that Abe had agreed that Japan would shoulder the cost, which Kyodo said amounted to around US$3 billion.

Japan’s top government spokesman, Yoshihide Suga, said on Tuesday Abe had not agreed to any additional costs.