(Lausanne) The International Olympic Committee now authorizes 22 Russians and 17 Belarusians to participate under a neutral banner in the Paris Olympics (July 26–August 11), according to a second list expanded Thursday to include tennis, shooting and rowing.
The IOC, which published on June 15 a first list limited to four disciplines, also indicated that it had received its first refusals, coming from two Russians including the cyclist Aleksandr Vlasov, and five Belarusians.
Conversely, 18 athletes have already confirmed their presence –– three cyclists, three trampoline specialists, two weightlifters and ten wrestlers – while the two Belarusian rowers and the two Belarusian fencers have yet to make their response known.
Same suspense in tennis where the Russians Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev, current world No.5 and No.6, were invited, as well as, for women, the Belarusians Aryna Sabalenka (N.3) and Victoria Azarenka (N.16) and the Russians Daria Kasatkina (N.14) and Liudmila Samsonova (N.15).
To be invited to the Games, “neutral individual athletes” had to both overcome the obstacle of qualifications and a double check, by the international federations then the IOC, of their absence of active support for the war in Ukraine and of link with their country’s army.
The Olympic body must still update its list, as and when the final results of the qualifications come out: no athlete will be part of it since the World Athletics federation has maintained a total exclusion of Russians and Belarusians, while certain sports, like swimming, reintegrated them so late that their presence is uncertain.
It will then remain to be seen the response of Russian and Belarusian sports organizations: if Moscow finally gave up boycotting the Paris Games, its gymnasts have all decided to refuse to participate, while the rowing and judo federations are, conversely, willing to send athletes.
The Olympic organization, after initially banning athletes from the two countries from world sport after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, orchestrated their gradual return, under a neutral banner, under strict conditions and excluding straight away the team events.
Last March, the IOC expected 36 Russians and 22 Belarusians at the Paris Games “according to the most likely scenario”, and respectively 55 and 28 “at maximum”, i.e. a significantly sparser presence than during the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. : the Russians were 330, while Belarus had qualified 104 athletes.
