Athletes from Russia must fear an entry ban to Germany if they are re-admitted to international competitions. Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser announced that corresponding visa regulations would apply.
“Countries in which major sporting events take place are not powerless. You can control whether Russians can actually take part by issuing visas,” said the SPD politician to the newspapers of the “Funke Mediengruppe” and added: “If we organize international competitions in Germany , then we can act accordingly. We will always act with a clear stance here.”
The International Olympic Committee (IOC), headed by Germany’s Thomas Bach, recently recommended allowing athletes from both countries to return to competitions as neutral athletes, despite Belarus’ support for a Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. The condition for this is, among other things, that the athletes do not actively support the war and that they have no connections to the military or security agencies.
At the time, Faeser described the IOC decision as a “slap in the face to Ukrainian athletes”. “The Olympic Games don’t take place in a vacuum. Anyone who lets the warmonger Russia use international competitions for its propaganda harms the Olympic idea of peace and international understanding,” said the minister responsible for sport.
Athletics and equestrian sports with a clear attitude
The sports associations continue to react differently: In addition to the athletics association, the world equestrian association also recently insisted on excluding Russians and Belarusians. On the other hand, the President of the World Gymnastics Federation, Morinari Watanabe (Japan), spoke out in favor of their return and announced a decision on this in May.
The world wrestling association also supports the re-admission, the swimming world association announced that a task force should investigate a possible way for Russian and Belarusian athletes back to water sports events.
The Ukrainian government had asked the country’s athletes to boycott competitions with athletes from Russia or Belarus.