Former IOC president Samaranch’s funeral begins with Rogge pledging to preserve his legacy

Former IOC president Samaranch’s funeral begins

BARCELONA, Spain — The coffin holding former IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch, draped with the Olympic flag, has been wheeled into the Catalonia state headquarters to the sound of the Olympic hymn.

The procession was watched by the Spaniard’s family and a host of international figures and dignitaries, ahead of Samaranch’s funeral later Thursday.

Current International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge says only Pierre de Coubertin, the French baron who founded the modern games, was more influential for the Olympic movement.

Rogge called Samaranch a “generous and compassionate man” who left a “great legacy” that the IOC pledges to preserve.

Samaranch died Wednesday at a hospital in Barcelona.