The annual gathering of top officials in the Olympic Movement had been set to take place in the Russian city from May 23 to 28 this year, before being postponed until November 7 to 12 because of the coronavirus pandemic, and has now been delayed again.

May 15 to 20 in 2022 is the new window allocated for the event.

A further delay will allow for more people to be able to attend the World Sport and Business Summit, organisers hope.

"The Russian Federation will host a momentous edition of SportAccord in Ekaterinburg, so it is important that as many friends and colleagues as possible can gather in person from across the sporting world," SportAccord President Raffaele Chiulli said.

"The safety and wellbeing of our delegates has always been our top priority, and the measures developed by the Organising Committee in Ekaterinburg will still be as relevant and applicable when SportAccord takes place next year.

"However, with further vaccination roll-outs over the coming months, we are confident that global travel restrictions will have been relaxed by then to enable as many delegates as possible to travel to Ekaterinburg, ensuring the ultimate success of the event for the Russian Federation and SportAccord."

Organisers had previously considered offering complimentary COVID-19 vaccines for delegates attending the summit.

The SportAccord World Sport and Business Summit has not been held since 2019, when Australia's Gold Coast was the destination.

Chinese capital Beijing and then Olympic capital Lausanne in Switzerland had been due to stage the 2020 edition, but the pandemic led to it being cancelled altogether. 

The summit in Yekaterinburg will now take place fewer than 15 months before the city is due to host the 2023 Summer World University Games.

Russia hosted the event twice before - in Sochi in 2015 and in Saint Petersburg in 2013.

The country has so far reported more than 6 million COVID-19 cases and in excess of 160,000 deaths.

Russia has been allowing mass gatherings, notably letting more than 25,000 fans watch UEFA European Championship matches in Saint Petersburg when capacity was capped at 50 per cent for the seven games played at the Krestovsky Stadium.

However, with the SportAccord World Sport and Business Summit a global event, the health situation elsewhere is as relevant as in Russia, and strict travel restrictions remain in place across much of the globe as countries with lower vaccination rates seek to guard against fresh waves of infection, especially of the more transmissible Delta variant.