Russia's political history was reflected in the opening of the Sochi 2014 Games.
by Philip Barker
The way has been cleared for Russian and Belarusians to compete at Paris 2024 after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board introduced a designation of Individual Neutral Athletes (AINs) this week.
Those who “have qualified through the existing qualification systems of the International Federations (IFs) on the field of play will be declared eligible to compete,” an IOC statement said.
“They will also have to sign the updated Conditions of Participation applicable for Paris 2024. This contains a commitment to respect the Olympic Charter, including “the peace mission of the Olympic Movement”
This is a requirement for all competitors at Paris 2024.
Russian and Belarus competitors will be required to comply with the recommendations drawn up by the IOC in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.
These stipulate that “Teams of athletes with a Russian or Belarusian passport will not be considered.”
“Athletes who actively support the war will not be eligible to be entered or to compete. Support personnel who actively support the war will not be entered.”
“Athletes who are contracted to the Russian or Belarusian military or national security agencies will not be eligible to be entered or to compete. Support personnel who are contracted to the Russian or Belarusian military or national security agencies will not be entered.”
The IOC has indicated that 11 AINs, eight from Russia and three from Belarus have so far qualified for the Games.
It is 100 years since the matter of Russian participation at Paris 1924 had also been raised.
Russian athletes had competed in the Olympics in Tsarist times and Prince Leon Ouroussoff had been co-opted as an IOC member in 1910.
He had relocated to Paris in the wake of the Russian Revolution.
In his Olympic Memoirs Coubertin recorded Ouroussoff’s plea to his fellow members at the 1923 IOC Session in Rome.
“It was not without emotion that we heard our colleague Prince Leon Ouroussoff, a former diplomat, describe the lot of his compatriots divided into two groups which, with complete liberalism, he asked to be given equal rights to take part in the Games in Paris.”
The minutes stated “in the present state of affairs the Olympic rules prevent Russian participation in the Games.”
The idea was therefore rejected.
“I always regretted the way in which his proposal was received and rejected for “administrative” reasons,” Coubertin admitted later.
“Nobody realised better than I, the practical difficulties involved nor the perhaps insoluble problems its application would raise, but I think that the IOC would have brought honour on itself had it given the proposal a different welcome.”
In fact it was not until 1952 that athletes from Russia competed in the Olympic team, when they were of course styled as the Soviet Union.
A further flashpoint over neutrality came in 1980 when some 18 European National Olympic Committees resolved to use the Olympic Flag at the Moscow Olympics as a declaration of independence from governments seeking to impose a boycott because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
British Olympic Association Chairman Sir Denis Follows noted that the gesture a means of registering their opposition to the military action of the Soviet government.
By the new Millennium, the IOC had begun to deploy the use of neutral flags as a means to enable athletes to participate when no structure yet existed for them to do so, as in the case of former Yugoslavia in 1992 and East Timor in 2000.
It was also used when athletes would otherwise have suffered by the suspension of their NOC as in the case of India in 2014 and Kuwait in 2016.
In the wake of the revelations of organised doping which followed the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, some Russian athletes were banned from 2016.
For the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics of 2018, the designation Olympic Athlete from Russia was used.
Competitors were not required to “refrain from any public form of publicity, activity and communication” associated with the Russian flag or national anthem.
The regulations were modified for Tokyo and Beijing where Russians competed under a flag bearing the emblem of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC).
An extract of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto Number One was played at medal ceremonies.
Aleksandr Bolshunov’s gold in the 50km cross country, a race shortened because of weather conditions in the mountains was presented at the Closing Ceremony of the Beijing Games and remains the most recent Olympic medal awarded to date.
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