The Olympic Winter Games and the World Cup will take place next year. Will Russian athletes take part? It doesn’t seem excluded.
Russian athletes are still closed to large sporting events. However, the latest developments related to the phone call between US President Donald Trump and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin make you take notice. In addition to Ukraine, they are also said to have spoken about the execution of ice hockey games. How does sports policy influence the international relationship between the countries?
Trump and Putin apparently want to organize games in their countries in which both professionals from the North American league (NHL) and the Russian -shaped league (KHL) can take part. The US news agency AP reports that the NHL should only have learned from the plans after the phone call. In addition, no discussions about ice hockey are mentioned in the Weißen House report on the phone call. When asked by AP, the NHL said: “Of course we were not involved in these conversations, and for us it would be inappropriate for us to comment.”
Even without a clear statement by the NHL on the possible plans of Trump and Putin, the topic is smoldering in ice hockey. Because the fact is: from May 9th the World Cup will take place in Denmark and Sweden – and Russia remains excluded due to the war in Ukraine. The country of President Putin has not been allowed to participate in international ice hockey events since 2022. Just as little as at other major sporting events. But the situation could change soon. There are already first signs of this.
The President of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), Luc Tardif, would like to see Russia and Belarus “as soon as possible” at the international tournaments. In figure skating, ice skating and shorttrack, the International Eislaufunion (ISU) will again allow Russians and Russians to qualify for the Olympic qualification for Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo in the coming year. It would then be possible to start these athletes under a neutral flag and under certain conditions, as was the case at the summer games in Paris.
However, there are also winter sports such as biathlon, tobogganing or skiing alpine, where it does not look like a timely return of Russian athletes and a turn. The Norwegian biathlon star Sturla Holm Lægreid recently said: “We all know what is going on in Ukraine, in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. That is why we want our support for PiDrutschny (Ukrainian biathlete, Note d. Red.) and show the rest of the Ukrainian people. “
What exactly does Putin want to achieve with US President Trump through the above? What role does sports in politics play?
Jürgen Mittag, professor of sports policy at the German Sports University Cologne, recently said on Deutschlandfunk that there was movement because the International Olympic Committee (IOC) took the course from an “exclusion decision to a return to dialogue”.
Why? “This simply has competitive reasons, financial reasons. And the logic that Russia is ultimately more successful, better, despite the fundamental concerns that are certainly further in the room from international politics. And thus, so, for a certain extent, a certain door opener function really comes up with regard to international politics,” continued at noon.