More than a dozen Russian and Belarusian athletes will compete at the upcoming Paris Olympics under an impartial flag, after the International Olympic Committee said last year they could simply compete without representing their country, a move that has sparked backlash. and calls for a boycott by several countries in the Russian context. Invasion of Ukraine.
Last January, the IOC announced that Russian and Belarusian athletes would be eligible to compete in the Olympic Games if they do not constitute their country or an organization affiliated with their country, adding that any athlete who actively supports the Russian invasion of Ukraine would not be able to compete. .
Allowing athletes from both countries to compete is part of a broader “unifying project of the Olympic Movement,” the IOC said at the time.
Six months later, the IOC banned Russia and Belarus from participating in the Paris Olympics, citing similar bans issued through the governing bodies of tennis, cycling and football, while stressing that the ban would affect the “safety and integrity” of the Olympics.
For Russian or Belarusian athletes to participate, they will first have to petition the governing bodies of the sports in which they intend to compete before seeking approval from an IOC review committee, which will judge whether the athlete has expressed themselves to favor of the Russian. invasion or has ties to sports clubs affiliated with the Russian military, according to the IOC.
If approved, Russian and Belarusian athletes will participate as “impartial individual athletes” and will bring an INA flag, which represents the French translation of the title, while sporting the red, white and blue colors of the French flag on their uniforms.
If an athlete from either country wins a gold medal, their national anthem will be replaced by music commissioned through the IOC.
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After Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the IOC said it “strongly condemns” Russia’s violation of the Olympic Truce, a UN-backed solution that bans all war and a week after the competition. Prior to the ban, Russia had traditionally been a success at the Olympics, totaling 71 medals in total at the 2021 Olympics. Subsequently, other sports organizations have issued bans against Russian and Belarusian athletes, including Wimbledon and the International Cycling Union. Some organizations, such as the United States Open, have warned that it is wrong to punish individual athletes, saying they do not deserve to be held “responsible for the movements and decisions of their governments. “Russia faced sanctions in five games following a state-sponsored doping scandal at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. These sanctions required Russian athletes to compete under the ROC flag and call and expired in December 2022, although the World Anti-Doping Agency said last year that Russia was still “in default. “
The IOC said in March that no Russian or Belarusian athlete invited to compete would not be allowed to participate in the opening rite of the Paris Olympics.
17. This is the number of Russian athletes who as of July 20 accepted invitations to participate in the Olympic Games under an impartial flag, while 20 rejected the invitations. Russia, competing under the flag of the Russian Olympic Committee, won two of the 8 gold medals awarded in taekwondo at the Tokyo 2021 Olympic Games, no Russian athlete has been approved for the game this year. Nine Russian athletes first accepted invitations to wrestling occasions but then declined, the IOC said. Among Belarusian athletes, 17 accepted invitations and seven refused to compete, among them the most sensible former tennis player Victoria Azarenka. Azarenka, who moved to the United States from Belarus as a teenager, was booed after losing to Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina at Wimbledon last year. Before the match, Svitolina said that she would refuse to shake hands with Russian or Belarusian players (a resolution Azarenka said she “respects”) and called on tennis organizations to avoid handshakes between Russian and Belarusian athletes. and Ukrainians.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was among the first to criticize the IOC’s resolution to allow Russian and Belarusian athletes to participate, telling French President Emmanuel Macron that they “deserve not to have a place at the Paris Olympics. “Zelensky also told IOC President Thomas Bach that “you cannot try to be impartial when the foundations of a non-violent life are destroyed. “Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, warned last year that Russian and Belarusian athletes deserve to be excluded from the Olympics while Russia is at war with Ukraine. Representatives from 34 countries, including the United States, Canada and host country France, told a joint meeting shortly after the IOC resolution that they “do not agree” that Russian or Belarusian athletes deserve to be admitted, after Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Denmark threatened not to compete in protest.
The UN Human Rights Council supported Russian and Belarusian athletes competing in the Olympics, saying in a letter cited by the IOC: “Everyone has the right to be discriminated against because of their passport. »
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