The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is not on the wrong side of history, after opening the door for Russian and Belarusian athletes to participate in next year’s Summer Olympic Games in Paris, president Thomas Bach said on Sunday.
The IOC received a backlash after setting out a path last month for athletes of both countries to earn slots for the Olympics through Asian qualifying and to compete as neutrals, with no flags or anthems.
Athletes from Russia and Belarus have been banned from many international competitions in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago.
Photo: AP
In a letter to Bach last week, Ukrainian athletes said the IOC was “on the wrong side of history” after Bach had urged Ukraine to drop threats of a boycott.
When asked on Sunday if the IOC was on the wrong side of history, Bach told reporters “no.”
“History will show who is doing more for peace. The ones who try to keep lines open, to communicate, or the ones who want to isolate or divide,” he said.
“We’re trying to find a solution that is giving justice to the mission of sport, which is to unify, not to contribute to more confrontation, more escalation,” he said.
Lithuania’s sports minister on Friday said that a group of 35 countries, including Australia, Germany and the US, would demand that Russian and Belarusian athletes be banned from the 2024 Olympics.
TASS news agency quoted Russian Minister of Sport Oleg Matytsin was as saying that the calls were “absolutely unacceptable.”
Bach, speaking at the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships in Courchevel, France, said the IOC stood in “solidarity” with Ukraine’s athletes.
“With every Ukrainian athlete, we can from a human point of view understand their reactions, we share their suffering,” he said.
“Every Ukrainian athlete can be rest assured that we are standing in full solidarity with them and that all their comments are taken very, very seriously into consideration,” he added.
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