World Taekwondo Federation – Keeping the Tradition Alive

The purpose of organizing the World Taekwondo Federation is to circulate and regulate Taekwondo along with its traditional Taekwondo spirit throughout the world.

The Federation seeks to recognize the ideals, “Swiftly, Powerfully and Accurately” through the medium of Taekwondo competition being held around the world.

The World Taekwondo Federation promotes the principles that the Kukkiwon, or the center of traditional Taekwondo, has to be adopted in respect to Taekwondo philosophy, development of techniques and Dan certification.

Organization and membership.

World Taekwondo Federation membership consists of National Taekwondo Associations representing their respective nations or self-governing territories with the recognition of the federation.

The approval of the Executive Council and the General Assembly of the federation is required for one to be accepted as a member. The National Association applying for the membership of the World Taekwondo Federation are required to present their designated application documents together with a letter of recognition from the pertinent National Olympic Committee.

In addition to that, they are also required to hand over a letter that pledges to send out at least three or more competitors to the World Taekwondo Championships and the World Junior Taekwondo Championships.

After all the requirements are met and accepted, the applicants are admitted as provisional members until their admittance are finally approved. Provisional members have no voting right though, but are able to participate in all international Taekwondo competitions approved or promoted by the World Taekwondo Federation.

The federation shall approve only one association for each nation or each self-governing territory on the condition that its NOC having recognition from the IOC has recognized the association.

All the affiliated member National Associations and regional organizations shall represent their respective statutes strictly in compliance with the principles of the federation Rules and Regulations so as not to break any provisions that may be stated.

Any member of the National Association may withdraw its membership from the World Taekwondo Federation.

All members are obligated to send out at least three or more competitors to the World Taekwondo Championships and the World Junior Taekwondo Championships.

The membership status of those who do not take part in those competitions for two consecutive years without justifiable reasons including natural calamities are set to be demoted as provisional members.

The demoted members will no longer be able to exercise voting rights in official meetings, though they still retain the right to compete in all official competitions of the federation.

But their full membership status can be restored when they present a document to the World Taekwondo Federation confirming their impending participation in one of the two Championships together with a letter pledging to dispatch at least three or more competitors to the both Championships in the days to come.

Headquarters and official language.

The headquarters of the World Taekwondo Federation is be located permanently in Seoul, Korea.

The official languages are English, French, German, Spanish and Korean.

In case of disagreement over interpretation or translation, the English language version shall prevail. But in case of disagreement over interpretation of technical matters of Taekwondo, the Korean original version will be the one to prevail.

The members of the World Taekwondo Federation have the right to speak their mother language or any language they are comfortable with. But then, their speech should be translated to the five official languages in behalf of the other members.