Lhe ideal of peace through sport has never seemed so distant. At the end of a week of unprecedented tensions since the end of the Cold War, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and Russia observe each other like the two Koreas on either side of their demilitarized border. An attentive spectator of the escalation between Lausanne and Moscow, Ukraine emerged strengthened.
Exasperated by Russia’s growing “aggressiveness” towards him, the IOC, long accused of complacency towards Moscow, handed out uppercuts on Tuesday March 19: exclusion of Russian and Belarusian athletes from the Olympic opening ceremony on the Seine; firm condemnation of the Friendship Games, these “counter-Olympics” that Russia seeks to rehabilitate in September; strengthening of the neutrality framework, condition for the participation of athletes from the two pariah countries…
Groggy by this news “humiliation”the Putinian power then fell into overbidding and insulting, accusing the IOC of “switch into racism and neo-Nazism”. The rhetoric is not new, the same arguments were used against kyiv to justify the invasion of Ukraine at the end of February 2022.
Ukrainians, in fact, drink whey. For two years, they have been lobbying hard against the presence of the Russians at the Paris Games. “The IOC has made it clear that Russia has no place in international sport”welcomed Wednesday the Ukrainian Minister of Sports, Matvi Bidny, after the IOC decision, “highly anticipated”.
Symbolic victory for kyiv
Jostled by Russian troops on the military field, kyiv has just won its first victory on the Olympic front. Not the most decisive but certainly the most symbolic: the “battle of the Seine”. Because it’s a safe bet that the yellow and blue delegation will receive a warm welcome along the six kilometers of banks on July 26. Woe to those who are absent, the images will make history.
But this is not enough in the eyes of Ukrainians. For kyiv, no Russian, neutral or not, should see Paris. The simple fact that they hold a Russian passport automatically disqualifies them, believes Matvi Bidny. “In Russia, sports and athletes are used as instruments of hybrid warfare against the civilized world”commented the Ukrainian Minister of Sports on the media Tribuna.com.
Behind the scenes, kyiv is activating its networks. Contacts with the IOC and the French government are regular; clips on social media call for a boycott of Russians; Ukraine keeps up to date a list, published at the beginning of February, of athletes who do not respect the neutrality criteria imposed by Lausanne, with supporting evidence. And a petition signed to date by more than 260 Ukrainian athletes was sent at the end of summer 2023 to President Macron and the French organizers of the Games, demanding the total exclusion of Russians and Belarusians…
You have 15.37% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.