The 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin will break the audience record for Winter Olympic Games with more than 3 billion people watching the Games on television, Italian News Agency ANSA said in Rome on Friday.

According to a report from the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the number of audience is up 5 percent from the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

The viewers of the Turin Olympics will increase thanks to the major global TV coverage with 200 countries broadcasting the Games compared to 160 countries where the population could watch the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.

The African countries which will show the Turin Olympics will be 40 against two in 2002.

Broadcasters all over the world will dedicate more than 13,000 hours to Olympic coverage.

Italian state television RAI will broadcast a total 244 hours from the Olympic Games.

Compared to the Salt Lake City Olympics, the coverage of the Turin Games will increase by 111 percent in China, by 563 percent in Britain and by 12 percent in the United States where the NBC television network has planned 416 hours of coverage, which will exceed the hours of broadcasting of the Salt Lake Olympics held on home soil.

For the first time in the history of the Olympics the audience in some 20 countries will be able to watch the Turin Games on the latest generation mobile phones.