The Bahrain Grand Prix had been scheduled to open the 2011 season on 13 March but was called off in February because of anti-government protests.

Bahrain's Crown Prince made the decision to cancel the race, with Ecclestone commenting at the time that it was the right choice.

The Gulf state is still under martial law after a month of protests which Middle East analysts say have been caused by tensions between the ruling Sunni minority and Shia majority.

Ecclestone told Reuters that extending the deadline, which is due to expire on Sunday, would give organisers more time to assess the political situation.

"Things can change in a couple of weeks... so you don't know," he added.

"All of a sudden everything might be peaceful in a month's time and they are happy to run the event and so we are happy to be there.

"We need to wait a little bit to see exactly how progress is made. I suppose we'd be safe by early June or something like that."

The sport's 80-year-old commercial supremo added that he might have to say "bye-bye Bahrain" but a decision was not imminent.

The FIA told BBC Sport, however, that it is not aware of any plans to extend Bahrain's deadline.

"As far as we are concerned a decision is still due on Sunday," an FIA spokesman said.

"Because it's a weekend it may be Monday morning that we announce the decision, but we haven't spoken to Mr Ecclestone about any delay.

"The decision will be a joint one between the FIA, Formula One Management and the Bahrain authorities."

If Bahrain is restored to the 2011 calendar it has been suggested it could become the penultimate race of the season.

Ecclestone is considering 20 November, the week after the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, which could mean the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix is moved back by a week.

The F1 supremo also commented on the future of the Turkish Grand Prix, saying he was hopeful it would remain on the calendar despite a local official commenting this week that the 2011 event would be the last.

The Istanbul race has failed to attract large crowds and the government is baulking at what it says is Ecclestone's demand for double the fee next year, understood to be around £15.5m.

"Turkey is a good circuit," said Ecclestone, who is also the race promoter in Turkey. "All the facilities there are good, everything is good except we don't have a big crowd.

"I would be disappointed if we lose it but we can't keep subsidising it.

"When our first agreement was made, they [the government] subsidised ticket revenue so everyone was expecting a whole bunch of people to be there and if there wasn't, the government was going to make up for the missing tickets.

"It looks very much like the crowd is going to be much bigger this year, so it means the government's involvement will be considerably less."

Source = BBC Formula 1 Website - http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/formula_one/13224497.stm