MOSCOW, December 14. /TASS/. Recommendations regarding admission of the Russian athletes to the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris need to be thoroughly analyzed, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.
"I've always said that athletes are training for years, and we must provide them with an opportunity to participate in grand tournaments, including the Olympic Games," he said during his combined Direct Line Q&A session and year-end press conference.
The 2024 Summer Olympic Games will be hosted by the French capital of Paris between July 26 and August 11.
"Everyone knows that this is our flag flying, everyone knows that this is our athlete participating, it is obvious," Putin said. "That's why I kept supporting the participation of our athletes in such competitions, but at the moment we need to thoroughly analyze conditions on behalf of the International Olympic Committee [IOC]."
According to Putin, the conditions set by the IOC for the admission of Russian athletes to the Paris Olympics next year may artificially prevent the national team’s leaders from participating in the event.
"If these artificial conditions seek to prevent our leaders, the athletes who are capable of winning gold, silver and bronze medals [from participating in the Games], exhaust our team and make it seem that Russian sports is dying instead of developing, then the Ministry of Sports and the Russian Olympic Committee need to assess the situation and make a balanced decision," the Russian president stated.
On October 12, the IOC suspended the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) until further notice after the Russian organization included the Olympic councils of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR), the Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions as its members.
The Swiss-based CAS registered on November 6 an appeal from the ROC against the IOC’s decision on the Russian governing Olympic body’s suspension.
The suspension means that the ROC cannot act as a national Olympic committee or receive financing from the Olympic movement. The IOC however reserved the right to clear Russian athletes to take part in the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024 as neutrals. Later, IOC President Thomas Bach said that Russian athletes should have no affiliation with the ROC if they want to compete at the Olympic Games.
IOC sanctions against Russia, Belarus
On February 28, 2022, the International Olympic Committee issued recommendations to international sports federations to bar athletes from Russia and Belarus from taking part in international tournaments, citing Moscow’s special military operation in Ukraine as the reason.
Following the IOC’s recommendations in late February 2022, the majority of global sports federations decided to bar athletes from Russia and Belarus from all international sports tournaments.
In late March, 2023, the IOC recommended to permit individual athletes from Russia and Belarus to take part in international sports tournaments, but only under certain conditions. Specifically, athletes from the two countries should not be "actively supporting" Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine and must compete under a neutral status. Russia and Belarus were also banned from participating in international team events.
On July 26, 2023, the IOC extended invitations to the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris to 203 National Olympic Committees. Russia and Belarus did not receive invitations. The IOC explained later that there was no deadline regarding the issue of Russian and Belarusian athletes’ participation.