March 19 (Bloomberg) -- Beijing Games organizers are tearing out toilets at the three main Olympic stadiums after forgetting to include western-style lavatories.

Toilets installed at the main Bird's Nest stadium and the swimming and gymnastics venues were all squat-style, a Beijing Olympic Games Organizing Committee official said today.

Most will be replaced with sit-down lavatories to accommodate overseas athletes and visitors, said Yao Hui, deputy director for venue management. Beijing is using the Olympics to promote itself as an international city.

``Most Chinese people are used to squat toilets,'' Yao told reporters in Beijing. ``I believe the Olympic Games will be an opportunity to speed up the transition of cultural habits to meet international requirements.''

The National Aquatics Center, or ``water cube,'' and the National Indoor Stadium were also fitted out with just squat toilets. Other venues will add sit-down toilets if ``the technical designs'' permit, Yao said, without elaborating or providing renovation costs.

The 91,000-seat Olympic National Stadium, nicknamed the bird's nest because of the design of its steel casing, will be completed at the end of April, Yao said. The Aquatics Center and Indoor Stadium are already finished and have staged test events.

``After the test events we received a lot of suggestions,'' Yao added, ``and questions were raised about the toilets.''

Beijing is promoting etiquette in the run-up to the Aug. 8- 24 Games and has run campaigns to stop spitting and line- jumping. Organizers are expecting more than 1.5 million visitors, including 500,000 from overseas, for the first Olympics to be held in China.

To contact the reporter on this story: Wing-Gar Cheng in Beijing at wgcheng@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: March 19, 2008 03:15 EDT