Polstjanaja, who was admitted to Latvian citizenship in April 2018 and has dual citizenship of Latvia and Russia, claimed on Instagram in August that she was banned from participating in this year’s world championship, which will take place in mid-September in Bulgaria. The athlete allowed the possibility that the European Championship held in June might have been the last competition in her career.
Explaining her statement in more detail, Polstianaja claimed to the LETA agency that she had been sent a letter with an ultimatum – to renounce her Russian citizenship and continue to represent Latvia or she would be excluded from the national team.
As the LETA agency found out in the Latvian Olympic Committee (LOK), the Latvian Olympic Unit (LOV) sent a letter to the LVF at the end of July with the aim of obtaining information about the athlete’s future plans regarding the status of Russian citizenship. Athletes who, at the same time as Latvia, also have the citizenship of Russia or Belarus, cannot apply for Latvian budget funds, including LOV funding, however, even without receiving support from Latvian budget funds, they are not prevented from representing Latvia.
Polstianaya told the LETA agency that she cannot give up her Russian citizenship, because the athlete’s family, friends and relatives live in Russia.
Last week, the LVF allowed Polstiana to participate in the world championships at her own expense and indicated that she must inform within a week whether she will participate in the World Challenge Cup in Romania in late August and the world championships in Bulgaria in mid-September.
“We received an answer from her that she currently refuses to compete under the Latvian flag. Her emotional state has worsened and it is impossible to train in Latvia, and she does not see the point of continuing her sports career in Latvia,” Prokofieva revealed to the LETA agency on Wednesday.
Last week, Polstyanaya also spoke a little about her situation to the Russian state broadcaster “Rossija 24”, which was banned in Latvia after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in connection with a direct threat to national security.
“On our part, we did everything to help solve this situation, but she chose to turn to the media first. We don’t think it’s right for an athlete to solve internal disagreements through the media,” said Prokofieva.
The 19-year-old Polstjanaya won 15th place in the all-around at last year’s world championships, but she was 12th at this year’s European championships.
Highlight the text and press Ctrl+Enterto send the text fragment to be corrected to the editor!
Highlight the text and press on Report a bug buttons to send the text fragment to be corrected to the editor!
