As Andrew Parsons opened the 50th Paralympic Winter Games in Verona last Friday, speaking of a “new generation of heroes” and the “infinite human potential,” the damage was already done and plainly visible. The celebratory atmosphere was muted, and the Games began under a cloud of protest and controversy.
The head of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) delivered his remarks not only in an arena that was only partially filled, but also as several nations, including Germany, stayed away from the athletes’ parade in protest. The reason for the boycott, and according to local helpers, a segment of the audience, was the presence of Russian Para athletes, who were permitted to compete under their own flag following an IPC decision in September.
Who is a Good Soldier, and Who is a Disappointing One?
The desperate situation of Ukrainian athletes, who have been fighting for survival since the Russian invasion just before the Paralympic Winter Games in Beijing four years ago, has not changed. What has changed is the IPC’s stance. While Parsons emphasized in his opening remarks at the 2022 Paralympics in China that he was “shaken” by world events, without naming the Ukrainian victims or Russian perpetrators, Putin’s invasion at least resulted in sanctions against the Para athletes representing Russia, forcing them to compete under a neutral flag. That firewall crumbled with the decision at the IPC General Assembly last September.
Parsons further fueled the controversy after recently hinting in a BBC interview that Russian veterans of the war in Ukraine would not be barred from participating in the Games. In other words, soldiers actively implicated in the suffering in Ukraine. The IPC told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) that, “It’s not the IPC’s job to decide who the world sees as a ‘good soldier’ and who a ‘bad soldier’ – that is for the courts to decide. For us, they are athletes.”
The Paralympic movement was founded in 1948 as an instrument for the rehabilitation of wounded veterans of World War II, and since the first Paralympic Games in 1960, soldiers wounded in combat have participated in the Games. The IPC maintains that this should continue: “At all Paralympic Games, the host country conducts background checks on all individuals applying for accreditation to determine who is allowed to participate in the Games and who is not.” Parsons clarified in his BBC interview that he and the IPC do not care what the Para athletes “did on the battlefield in the past.” While war crimes are, of course, another matter, “what we offer with this movement is a second chance.”
The IPC effectively shifts the responsibility for determining who receives that second chance to the host countries. This is likely to create a problematic situation, particularly for the United States, which will host the 2028 Paralympic Games. The U.S. Government does not recognize the International Criminal Court, which prosecutes crimes such as genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Theoretically, members of the Russian military, against whom numerous crimes have been alleged, could then participate. The IPC, at least, would have no problem with that scenario.
Criticism from the Ukrainian Committee
The position sparked outrage from the Ukrainian side. “I have read some messages from Russian soldiers that they wrote to their families,” said Valerii Sushkevych, chairman of the Ukrainian Paralympic Committee, to FAZ. “In one letter, a Russian soldier boasts: ‘Yesterday I cut off the ears of a Ukrainian prisoner.’ His mother replied: ‘Well done, my son.’ In another, horrific letter, I read how a soldier proudly told his wife that he had shot a woman and her two daughters on the street in an occupied town. Mr. Parsons, I invite you to read these letters.” Parsons and the IPC, Sushkevych argued, invoke the origins of the Paralympic movement as aid for wounded soldiers through sport, but fail to acknowledge that the original impetus was to support soldiers defending their homeland against fascism.
“Mr. Parsons may not care if a Russian soldier stands on the podium at the Paralympics. But for a Ukrainian Para athlete whose mother, wife, or daughter was killed, it is not the same,” Sushkevych said. “We are not afraid of former Russian soldiers returning to the Paralympics, because we stand for the Paralympic values. But if members of the Russian parliament are loudly calling for an invasion of Germany with soldiers, I would like to remind Mr. Parsons that the IPC headquarters is in Bonn.”
Russia, meanwhile, makes no secret of the fact that wounded soldiers from the war against Ukraine are being “recycled” as Para athletes for the sports front. As part of the large-scale state program “We Are Together – Sport,” the Russian Paralympic Committee has supported war veterans “who have suffered severe injuries and disabilities in the course of their military operations in Ukraine” with money and expertise.
Hundreds of wounded Russian veterans have already been actively promoted through sport in this way. Among them is Tsedin Geninov, who lost his leg in the war against Ukraine. “Many people ask me this question: ‘Aren’t you afraid? You are a war veteran and participated in the Special Military Operation. Won’t you be seen as a war criminal in Europe, for example?’” the Para archer said in a video on social media, countering, “Well, if someone is afraid of wolves, they should stay out of the forest.”
Voronchikhina’s “Feeling of Pride”
As of now, no war veterans are participating in the current Paralympic Games. The Russian Para athletes who are present have already achieved successes that their homeland can celebrate, such as in Para alpine skiing, where Warwara Voronchikhina won Russia’s first gold medal at the Paralympics under its own flag since the home Games in Sochi in 2014. For the first time in twelve years, the Russian national anthem was played: “Honestly, it’s exceptionally unusual not to have to worry anymore that there might be a symbol somewhere and there could be problems or sanctions for it,” Voronchikhina told Russian media. “It’s really a feeling of pride.”
The Ukrainians have also had a successful start to the Games, with ten medals won in the first two days, including three gold. Nevertheless, Sushkevych sees the return of the Russians to the Games and the potential participation of Russian veterans in the future as a visible sign of an internal decay of the Paralympics: “For many years, we have claimed that the Paralympic movement is a great step forward for humanity,” he said, also with reference to Parsons’ opening speech a few days earlier. “Today, we know that is no longer the case.”
The Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games are underway from March 6-15, featuring 611 Para athletes from 55 delegations. The competition takes place across six sports in venues spread between Milan, Cortina, and Val di Fiemme.
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