MOSCOW, May 29. /TASS/. Present-day sanctions against Russian sports are a manifestation of discrimination based on the national identity, Russian Sports Minister Mikhail Degtyarev said on Wednesday.

"IOC’s ban of our athletes is a discrimination based on the national identity," Degtyarev told journalists. "The same goes for sanctions against our [Moscow anti-doping] laboratory and the Russian Anti-Doping Agency [RUSADA]. This is hideous."

"We will carry on with the dialogue regarding this pressing issue on the sidelines of the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum [SPIEF] and will define the formats [of the dialogue] when the forum starts," the Russian sports minister added.

The St. Petersburg International Economic Forum will be held on June 5-8, 2024. TASS will be the information partner of the event.

IOC’s regulations against Russia

The International Olympic Committee Executive Board convened for a meeting at the Olympic House in Lausanne, Switzerland, on March 19-20 and following the opening day it decided to bar athletes from Russia and Belarus from taking part in the Parade of Athletes and also exclude them from the 2024 Olympics overall medal standings.

The IOC, however, ruled that Russian athletes, cleared to participate in the upcoming Olympics, would not have to sign anything denouncing their country’s special military operation in Ukraine.

On October 12, 2023, 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, 2023 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.