The Council of Europein a resolution he adopted during his summer plenary session in Strasbourg, called for the complete exclusion of Russian and Belarusian athletes from the Olympic and Paralympic Games, which will take place in 2024 in Paris“as long as Russia’s war in Ukraine continues.”

The assembly “urged the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and its constituent sports bodies to maintain the position expressed in 2022 and to ban these athletes from the next Olympic Games and all other major sporting events,” it said. characteristics in a relevant press release.

This resolution comes while the IOC “is currently considering the possibility of authorizing athletes with Russian or Belarusian passports to compete in Paris as ‘neutral athletes’the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe continues.

The IOC recommended last March that Russian and Belarusian athletes be reinstated in international competitions, under a neutral banner and “in an individual capacity”, provided that they did not support, and do not actively support, the war in Ukraine.

But PACE judges in its resolution that any participation of these athletes is “unthinkable” and “will certainly be used as a propaganda tool, while de facto preventing other athletes – especially Ukrainians – from participating.”

According to PACE, the arguments for their participation “do not carry sufficient weight in the face of the imperative to condemn and repudiate the atrocities committed and to show the full and unwavering support of the international community to Ukraine, where the offensive continues.”

According to the members of the Council of Europe assembly, “Russian and Belarusian top athletes received state salaries and often participated in military sports teams.”

“It seems impossible for them to demonstrate their neutrality and distance from these regimes, but also make a statement against the war,” they added, and those who did would “put themselves in a dangerous position.”

During a hearing last April before PACE, IOC representatives, including Gabi Ahrens, former fencer and president of the Athletes’ Committee of the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA), had asked that the athletes not be “condemned for the actions of their leaders”.

The French Minister of Sports, Amelie Untea Castera, had meanwhile estimated that it was up to the IOC to take a “sovereign decision” regarding the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes in the Olympic Games.