Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser wants to politically undermine the IOC decision on the reintegration of Russian and Belarusian athletes – if necessary. The SPD politician is considering an entry ban.
“Countries in which major sporting events take place are not powerless. They can control whether Russians can actually take part by issuing visas,” Faeser told the newspapers of the “Funke” media group.
Faeser emphasized: “If we organize international competitions in Germany, then we can act accordingly. We will always act with a clear stance here.”
On the other hand, Faeser ruled out a German boycott of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. “We would harm our own athletes who have worked towards this goal for a long time,” she said.
The federal minister responsible for sport in Germany described the IOC’s decision to recommend the return of Russian and Belarusian athletes to the world associations under certain conditions as a “slap in the face to the Ukrainian athletes”.
Faeser: IOC must prevent “catastrophic signal” on the Russia question
Now Faeser added: “Offering the warmonger Putin a propaganda stage would betray all the values of sport. The IOC must prevent this catastrophic signal.”
It is “completely unacceptable for Ukrainian athletes to face athletes who compete for a country that kills so many civilians in Ukraine.”
With its controversial decision, the IOC had opened the door to a return to world sport for athletes from Russia and Belarus who had been banned for more than a year. A decision on their participation in the summer games in Paris should be made at a later date. Some world associations have already declared that they will follow the recommendation. The track and field association World Athletics wants to stay with the exclusion.
IOC President Thomas Bach described the European government officials’ criticism of the International Olympic Committee’s decision as “deplorable”, which can be translated as “regrettable”, but was received in large parts of the world as “disgraceful”.
Bach emphasizes the autonomy of sport and rejects political interference that would lead to the “end of world sport as we know it”.