On the remote eastern end of the German Empire, the Memel territory was separated from the rest of East Prussia and occupied by France before being annexed by Lithuania. Austria, which had been reduced to roughly its German-speaking areas, excluding the Sudetenland (the mostly German-inhabited areas of the Czech lands) and South Tyrol, was forbidden to re-join its former fellow states of the Holy Roman Empire by joining Germany. In response to the German failure to pay reparations under the Treaty of Versailles in 1923, France returned with the Occupation of the Ruhr area of Germany, the center of German coal and steel production, until 1925. Also, the French-dominated International Olympic Committee banned Germany from the Olympic Games of 1920 and 1924, which illustrates the French desire to isolate Germany.