Cabinet Bans Ukrainian Athletes from Participating in Competitions if There are Russian Reps there

The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has decided that Ukrainian athletes will boycott the 2024 Olympics tournaments, in which representatives of the Russian Federation and Belarus take part.

As reported in the the national telethon on Friday morning, March 31, this decision was a response to the new rules of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which allow athletes from the Russian Federation and Belarus to participate with a neutral status for individual competitions.

Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers Oleh Nemchinov said that the Ukrainian government made such a decision at the suggestion of the Minister of Youth and Sports of Ukraine, President of the National Olympic Committee Vadym Gutzeit.

"A protocol decision was made at a government meeting on the proposal of Gutzeit's colleague that we take part only in qualifying competitions where there are no Russians, and, accordingly, participation outside the boundaries of these criteria may be the basis for depriving the federation of the status of a national one," Nemchinov said on the air of the telethon.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       Earlier this week, Ukraine, Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania called on the IOC to prevent Russian and Belarusian athletes from participating in the Olympic Games under a neutral flag, stressing that Russia and Belarus can return their athletes to the international sports community by ending the war against Ukraine.

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