East Timor gets Olympic KO

The International Olympic Committee has ruled that East Timor does not qualify to participate in the Sydney Olympics.

"The situation at this stage is quite clear," IOC director general Francois Carrard said. "The IOC recognises National Olympic Committees from independent countries, states, recognised as such by the international community. And the situation at this date is that it does not recognise East Timor."

The IOC also said the devastated country didn't currently fulfill the basic criteria to have a recognised national Olympic committee.

IOC regulations require a country to be a fully independent state with at least five sports federations operating in its territory.

Currently, the United Nations is administering the former Indonesian province during its transition to independence.

Indonesian troops and their militia allies decimated much of the territory last year. East Timor's unofficial foreign minister Jose Ramos-Morta said the country had hoped to appear on the world stage as an independent nation for the first time.

He said East Timor only wanted to participate in the opening and closing ceremonies, to fly the flag of the U.N. Transitional Authority and its own flag and play its own national anthem.