Banned from the FIFA World Cup, the Paralympic Games, and several other international competitions, Russian athletes are the “collateral victims” of the war in Ukraine. Is it fair to make them pay for the behavior of their leader?
Since February 24 and the start of the invasion of Ukraine, the list of “excluded” continues to grow.
The Russian national football team will not participate in the next World Cup in Qatar, and the country’s clubs are banned from European football competitions. The same fate reserved for the national team and the Russian basketball clubs.
Many other sports federations followed this example, and finally, following some hesitation, the Paralympic Committee also decided to exclude all Russian athletes from the next Olympics. Even mediation proposing to have athletes compete under a “neutral” banner (as was done in Beijing this winter) was dismissed, with the Paralympic Committee saying this exclusion was necessary to avoid potential tensions between athletes, as well as boycotts. .
Faced with this wave of “sanctions”, some Russian athletes have broken the silence, in order to denounce decisions which seem unfair to them. Like the ex-Formula 1 driver, Daniil Kvyat, who, as reported by the Italian media Fanpage, expressed himself in these terms:
I really hope that peace will return to Ukraine, to see two sister nations engaged in a conflict horrifies me. But I would like to stress that sport should remain separate from politics. Do not allow the
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