UAE's hosting of World Summer Games is a source of pride for all Arabs

The UAE's hosting of the 2019 Special Olympics World Summer Games will be a source of pride for all Arabs, said Ayman Abdel Wahab, Regional President and Managing Director of the Middle East and North Africa region at the Special Olympics, the world's largest sports organisation for athletes with disabilities and special needs.

"We are very proud that it will be the first Olympic event to have been hosted in the Middle East and the Arab region. All eyes will be set on UAE when it hosts the largest Games in the history of the movement," he said in a statement at the conclusion of meetings of the regional presidents of Special Olympics in US capital where, earlier this week, the organisation's international board of directors met and unanimously voted to award Abu Dhabi the hosting rights for the 2019 Games.

The Special Olympics official congratulated President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, Their Highnesses the Supreme Council Members and Rulers of the Emirates, and the people of the UAE and all Arabs on the occasion.

The Special Olympics will hold a press conference in January 2017 in the UAE capital to provide details about the future event, Abdel Wahab revealed.

The event will mark another five decades of achievements by the global sports movement which will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2018, the Olympics official noted.

It all began in the 1950s and early 1960s, when American Eunice Kennedy Shriver saw how unjustly and unfairly people with intellectual disabilities were treated. She also saw that many children with disabilities didn’t even have a place to play, according to Special Olympics' website. She decided to take action and held a summer day camp for young people with intellectual disabilities in her own backyard.

The first International Special Olympics Summer Games were held in Chicago, Illinois, USA, in 1968.

In 1989, the Special Olympics Unified Sports initiative was officially launched brining together people with and without intellectual disabilities on the same team.

In 2003, Ireland hosted the first Special Olympics World Summer Games to be held outside the United States, and 12 years later, in 2015 in Los Angeles CA, the Summer Games made a comeback to the United States.