“The Ukrainian National Paralympic Committee and the Ukrainian National Paralympic Team, its athletes and coaches are subjected to systematic pressure from representatives of the International Paralympic Committee and the Organizing Committee of the Games. Ukraine has participated in all the Summer and Winter Paralympic Games in the last thirty years, but our team and the heads of the team headquarters have never experienced such open negative expressions and even obstacles,” the Ukrainian delegation said in a statement on Wednesday.
Ukrainian athletes say that the organizers of the games removed the Ukrainian flag from the Paralympic village, while the flags were allegedly taken from the family of cross-country skier Taras Rad as his relatives supported him during the race.
Parabiathlete Oleksandra Konovová, after the gold race, had to take off her earrings in Ukrainian colors and with the inscription “Stop the war” before the medal ceremony. Representatives of the Paralympic Committee and the Organizing Committee are also said to be consistently disrupting the tactical meetings of the Ukrainian delegation, The Guardian summarizes the allegations.
In conclusion, the Ukrainian delegation indicated that this could be the result of an “incomprehensible and very special partnership” between the Paralympic Committee and the committees of Russia and Belarus.
Photo: Sarah Meyssonnier, Reuters
Ukrainian golden pair biathlete Oleksandra Kononova
A considerable amount of attention is attached to the ongoing games precisely because, despite the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, Russian and Belarusian athletes can openly represent their homeland. In the case of the Russians, this is the first time since 2014.
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The organizers of the games responded to the accusations by the Ukrainian delegation with a statement in which they stated that they were investigating the whole matter, but that they had heard about some of the incidents mentioned by the Ukrainians for the first time. They commented in more detail only on the case of Konovová.
“When the competitor went to the podium, we noticed that she was wearing earrings with the inscription ‘Stop the War’. A staff member spoke to her and told her that this was probably a violation of our rules and asked her if she could take them off. The athlete agreed. For us, that was the end of the whole matter,” he said, referring to the rules prohibiting expressions of political opinion at the sports venue, which already caused controversy at the February Olympic Games, spokesman for the organizers.
Protests on the podium
The International Paralympic Committee is currently also dealing with the protests of some athletes on the podium in connection with the Russian participation. On Tuesday, after the skiing sprint for the visually impaired, which was won by Russia’s Anastasija Bagianová with guide Sergej Sinijak, silver medalist Linn Kazmaierová and her guide Florian Baumann did not smile during the Russian national anthem and demonstratively turned their backs to the winners.
“The announcement of the winners felt completely strange. I don’t know those people, maybe they don’t support the criminal system in Russia either. Maybe they are completely nice people with whom we could be friends under normal circumstances. But it’s a great shame that everything was so heavily overshadowed by politics. That’s why we decided to keep our hats on and not turn to the flags, because we don’t want to support it,” Kazmaierová told the German press.
Bauman was even more critical. “Four years ago, we had great contact with the Ukrainians in Beijing. We wanted to express solidarity with them. We are not talking about Russian athletes. It is also difficult for many of them now. But the decision of the International Paralympic Committee that Russia can start under its own flag, with its own anthem and everything, while the Ukrainians are here, just doesn’t seem right to me,” he described.
The Russians Bagianová and Sinijak also won gold in the ten kilometer race on Wednesday. Czech Simona Bubeníčková and tracer David Šrůtek finished silver in this race. On the winners’ podium, the German athletes behaved similarly to the Russian anthem the day before.
