The president supported the tennis star, but the player did not support the president.
Second-placed Aryna Sabalenka advanced to the semi-finals. ZUMAWIRE / MVPHOTOS
Belarusian tennis star Aryna Sabalenka25, announced on Tuesday at the French Open tennis tournament that he does not support his country’s president Alexander Lukashenko.
– I don’t want my country to be involved in any conflict. I don’t support war, Sabalenka said Reuters after defeating Ukraine in the quarter-final match of the tournament Elina Svitolina.
– I don’t support the war, which means I don’t support Alexander Lukashenko right now.
Autocratic Lukashenko has led Belarus since 1994. Supported by Lukashenka, Russia launched a full-scale war against Ukraine last year.
In January, Sabalenka achieved the only grand slam victory of her career so far at the Australian Open. At that time, Lukashenko praised his country’s star athlete.
Pressure from the game
Sabalenka has previously wanted to focus only on tennis and has not commented on the leader of her country so bluntly before.
In Paris, he skipped his two previous press conferences citing mental strength. Sabalenka has been asked for opinions on Belarus and Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine.
Sabalenka now said that she would not have felt safe in front of the media last week.
– I felt bad that I didn’t come here. I couldn’t sleep, Sabalenka said but added that she doesn’t regret the decision.
– I felt that I was treated really disrespectfully. A Grand Slam is enough pressure to handle in itself and I just tried to focus on myself and my game.
Shaking hands
The match between Sabalenka and Svitolina caused a minor commotion because the Ukrainian Svitolina refused to shake hands with the Belarusian and received boos from the audience.
the BBC according to Svitolina, she has not shaken hands with her Russian opponents since the start of the war and already announced before the Sabalenka match that she is not going to shake hands with the Belarusian either.
Despite the information, Sabalenka went to the net after the match to wait for a handshake.
Svitolina was of the opinion that Sabalenka was inciting the crowd to turn against her.
– I don’t know what he expected because my statements about the handshake were very clear, Svitolina said.
Sabalenka said after the match that walking to the net was an instinctive reaction.