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Russia to keep up training athletes despite their int’l tournaments’ suspensions — Putin

According to Russian President, this is not the reason for reducing the quality of training

UFA, October 17. /TASS/. Training of Russian professional should be maintained despite the country’s unfair suspension from international competitions, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.

"A forced pause in the broad participation of Russian athletes in international competitions is not the reason for reducing the quality of training of new generations of athletes, to weaken control over the rules of competitions, as well as medical and biomedical support of sports," Putin said at a session of the Russian Physical Culture and Sport Council in Ufa, the capital of the Russian Republic of Bashkortostan.

"We have been and will always be the supporters of the honest and clean sports," the Russian president added.

IOC’s regulations against Russia

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) 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 Paris Summer Olympics overall medal standings.

The IOC, however, ruled that Russian athletes, cleared to participate in the 2024 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 meant 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.

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