The World Indoor Athletics Championships scheduled to take place in the Chinese city of Nanjing next year have been postponed until March 2023, World Athletics announced on Thursday.

The event had already been moved from this year to March 19-21, 2021, because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

"While we have been liaising with the organising committee and the Chinese Athletics Association to evaluate the staging over the past few weeks, given the current global situation, there is still significant uncertainty about the state of the Covid-19 pandemic in the early part of 2021," track and field's governing body said in a statement.

The Nanjing event will now take place a year after the 2022 world championships in Belgrade.