2024-03-21 00:20:05
The entrance to the headquarters of the International Olympic Committee, in Lausanne (Switzerland), March 14, 2024. CLARA WATT FOR “THE WORLD”
Moscow’s response to the declarations, Tuesday March 19, of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was expected; she was scathing. Wednesday morning March 20, Russian diplomacy accused the body based in Lausanne (Switzerland) of “switch into racism and neo-Nazism”. Remarks of rare virulence in reaction to the criticisms made the day before by the IOC on the “politicization of sport” by Russia via the organization of the Friendship Games, a competition competing with the Olympic Games (OG) that Moscow wants to rehabilitate in September.
The IOC described it on Tuesday as “cynical attempt” to exploit athletes “for political propaganda purposes”. Dmitri Peskov has little taste for criticism. The Kremlin spokesperson on Wednesday held the IOC responsible for “destroy the ideal of Olympism”, and of “harm the interests of Olympic athletes”. Russia also said « scandalized by the unprecedented discriminatory conditions imposed by the IOC on Russian athletes,” the day after new restrictions decreed by Lausanne.
On Tuesday, the boss of world sport indeed excluded Russian and Belarusian athletes of the parade of delegations on the Seine during the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics, less than two weeks after a similar decision by the International Paralympic Committee for the Paralympic ceremony. And it has taken a set of measures to ensure the neutrality of the champions of the two countries: an examination committee composed of three members of the IOC will be responsible for verifying the eligibility of qualified athletes; the medals obtained will not be counted in the ranking of nations, the master standard of the sporting power of countries; a neutral flag and anthem will be used in the event of a title or podium finish for the athletes concerned.
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These new restrictions reinforce the neutrality framework set by the IOC at the beginning of December 2023 as a sine qua non condition for the participation of Russians and Belarusians in Olympic competitions, provided, moreover, that they do not support or have not supported the war in Ukraine nor are they linked to the army. “The IOC’s decisions are illegal, unjust and unacceptable,” reacted Wednesday the spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova.
“A strong symbol”
Deteriorated since Russia was banned following the invasion of Ukraine at the end of February 2022, relations between Lausanne and Moscow have taken on a belligerent tone over the past forty-eight hours. The President of the IOC, Thomas Bach, explained in an interview with Mondepublished on March 18, “that the aggressiveness of the government [russe] grows day by day, against the IOC, against the Games, against me.” “It goes from “fascist” to “destroyer of the Games and the Olympic movement”,” detailed the former fencer, questioned about the terms used.
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