In a stunning but foreshadowed move, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced late Tuesday night that Japan had reached an agreement with International Olympic Committee chief Thomas Bach for the Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games to be postponed until next summer at the latest.

The announcement, which came after Abe’s call with International Olympic Committee chief Thomas Bach, Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, Tokyo 2020 Organizing Committee President Yoshiro Mori and Olympics minister Seiko Hashimoto, means the games will be postponed for the first time ever during peacetime.

The announcement also left open the possibility of a spring Olympics.

The IOC had announced on Sunday following an executive board meeting that a decision would be made as to whether the games would be postponed, canceled or held as scheduled within four weeks after further discussion.

And yet, just days later, the announcement was made in light of ongoing concerns that the quadrennial sporting event would exacerbate the coronavirus pandemic, which has spread to more than 170 countries around the world.

The fate of the 2020 Games had been up in the air for weeks amid concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic could spread further if millions of visitors from around the world descended on the Japanese capital in July for the opening ceremony.

Though postponement will spur huge financial losses for Japan, the IOC and almost all stakeholders — not to mention the athletes — the decision was made to delay the games by one year in hopes that the pandemic has subsided by then.