(OTTAWA) Federal Sports Minister Pascale St-Onge has proven the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) wrong over the possibility that Russian and Belarusian athletes could be 2024 Games in the French capital.
The federal government’s position in this regard is “clear: Russian and Belarusian athletes should not be allowed to participate in international sports competitions,” the minister said in a written statement provided by her office on Thursday.
“We continue to show our solidarity with Ukraine, and I encourage the international sports community to do the same,” she added.
The CEO and Secretary General of the COC, David Shoemaker, indicated a few hours earlier that the organization was not closed to the idea of these athletes competing under their banner, thus rallying to the position of the International Committee Olympic Games (IOC).
“We recognize that the decision to exclude athletes solely on the basis of their nationality goes against the principles that are at the heart of the Olympic Movement,” he said in a statement sent by the organization.
PHOTO FRANK GUNN, THE CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
David Shoemaker, COC CEO and Secretary General
Therefore, we are open to exploring a path leading to the inclusion of neutral Russian and Belarusian athletes who, at a minimum, respect the conditions established by the IOC Executive Board.
David Shoemaker, COC CEO and Secretary General
The United States is in the same movement.
The new President and CEO of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee, Gene Sykes, reiterated his organization’s support for exploring a path leading to the inclusion of Russian and Belarusian athletes under a neutral banner in the Paris Games.
However, he felt that the current sanctions against Russia should be maintained.
Boycott threats
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last week denounced the “hypocrisy” of the IOC and attacked its boss, Thomas Bach, brandishing at the same time the threat of a boycott of the 2024 Summer Olympics.
“I invite Mr. Bach to Bakhmout [ville assiégée de l’est de l’Ukraine] so that he can see with his own eyes that neutrality does not exist. It is obvious that any neutral flag of Russian sportsmen is stained with blood,” added the leader, who is said to have pleaded his case with French President Emmanuel Macron.
Russian and Belarusian athletes have been banned from most international competitions since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the international federations having followed the IOC’s “recommendation” to this effect.
Reactions to the IOC’s position vary from country to country.
The three Baltic countries (Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania) as well as Poland are considering a boycott of the Paris Olympics in 2024 if athletes from Russia and Belarus obtain permission to participate.
It would be the first such protest since the reciprocal boycotts of the Moscow Games in 1980, then the Los Angeles Games in 1984, in a Cold War context.
Canada, for its part, is not there yet.
The Trudeau government had not sent any diplomats to the Beijing Winter Games in 2022. This was a way of protesting against the host country and its “human rights violations” against the Uyghur Muslim minorities and Turkic in China.
With Agence France-Presse and the Associated Press