Russia’s return to sport: world sport splits over Russia

If the International Olympic Committee wanted to preserve the unity of world sport, then it failed in its guidelines on how athletes from Russia and Belarus can return to international sport. Of the sports planned for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, only twelve associations decided last month to follow the controversial IOC guidelines, eight are still examining this step and ten are sticking to the exclusion of athletes from the aggressor states in the Ukraine war. “There is a risk of organized irresponsibility and a patchwork quilt,” Maximilian Klein, director of sports policy at Athletes Germany, criticizes the situation. Others even fear a split in world sport. In any case, an agreement on common rules is not foreseeable.

At the end of March, more than a year after the start of the war, the IOC gave sports associations a framework on how they should allow athletes from Russia and Belarus again if they wish: complete neutrality, no flag, no anthem, no national colors on clothing, no teams. However, with much still remaining vague, even where Russians are allowed back, there is a mess. The boxers – whose Olympic status is at stake anyway – whistle on any neutrality under their Russian President Umar Kremlev. That’s why the World Cup is being boycotted by many western countries. The German Boxing Association did not send any athletes to Tashkent either.

The judoka admitted Russians as neutral athletes, but sent eight home before the start of the World Cup on Sunday in Doha because they had apparently supported the war on social media and could therefore not be considered neutral. The Ukrainian federation nevertheless withdrew its delegation because the government stopped providing financial support for participation in competitions with Russians.

Politicians are clearly involved in the debate, and even the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe debated a motion in Strasbourg last week to exclude athletes from the aggressor parties from the Olympic movement. “An admission in the context of the war against Ukraine is viewed by many as a gross violation of Olympic values ​​of peacekeeping and a possible propaganda vehicle for attackers,” said congregation President Tiny Kox.

Deputy Ukrainian Minister of Sport Andriy Chesnokov fundamentally doubted that there could be such a thing as neutral athletes. The IOC has also not developed an effective mechanism to prevent “the Russian government from exploiting the successes of its athletes for propaganda purposes”.

Since Russia has been excluded from the assembly since the beginning of the war, the hearing would have been rather one-sided had it not been for the IOC emissaries. President Thomas Bach did not accept the invitation, but above all let his representatives convey a message that Gaby Ahrens, spokeswoman for athletes of the African NOCs, formulated as follows: “Athletes should never pay the price for a conflict. And the politicians should not exert any pressure.” It sounded as if the IOC had already ruled out another ban on Russian athletes at the 2024 Olympics, although an official decision on this will only be made later.

Many questions remain unanswered, as France’s Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra explained: »Are doubles in tennis or duos in rowing already considered teams that are excluded? Can athletes who receive financial support from the state or state-controlled sponsors really be neutral? The selection process should actually be independent of the state in Russia and Belarus.« The IOC delegates did not go into these arguments.

Instead, the association refers to UN rapporteur Alexandra Xanthaki, who repeatedly describes the discrimination against Russian athletes as illegal: »They are punished for actions by their state leadership, and that also undermines the peace-building effect of sport. A blanket ban would rather promote the further division of world sport,” the Greek legal scholar claimed. The Ukrainian MP Yevheniia Kravchuk countered that “there is no fundamental right to get a stage at the Olympics”.

In fact, it is debatable whether an international starting ban actually limits the human right to exercise or merely represents a professional ban. If there were really an inalienable right to participate in the Olympics, team athletes would also have to be admitted. However, the IOC itself continues to recommend their exclusion – including their discrimination, which it denounces elsewhere?

Francesco Ricci Bitti, President of the Summer Sports Federation, emphasized on behalf of the IOC that the dialogue must be kept open and that sport is suitable as a place for peaceful events, where that dialogue is apparently encouraged. The Italian did not explain how this is supposed to work if even the IOC does not want to invite state representatives from Russia and Belarus and the neutral athletes are not allowed to express themselves politically.

His colleague Ahrens from Namibia therefore did not argue with the already questionable peace-making effect of sport, but rather advocated simple tolerance: “If the Olympic Games only become a platform for athletes from countries that think like that, they are no longer a good representation of the world. That would mean the end of world sport.«

That’s not enough for Oleksii Goncharenko. The parliamentarian, also from Ukraine, demanded a kind of attitude test from the IOC if the Olympics are already being praised as an event of peace: “If you want athletes from Russia and Belarus to take part, ask them to speak out in writing against the war! “Otherwise Olympia would be a disgrace,” said Goncharenko. However, the implementation of this plan is unlikely. “The athletes will have to sign a declaration,” Ricci Bitti later told L’Équipe. But you would not be asked to speak out against the war because that is criminally relevant in Russia.