German interior minister calls for entry ban on Russian athletes

By Timo Kirez

BERLIN (AA) – Russian athletes face a ban on entering Germany if they are allowed back into international competitions.

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser announced on Monday that corresponding visa regulations would be applied. "Countries where major sporting events take place are not powerless," the politician told the newspapers of the Funke Mediengruppe media company.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC), headed by Germany's Thomas Bach, has recently recommended allowing athletes from Russia and Belarus to return to competitions as neutral athletes.

One of the conditions for this is that the athletes do not actively support the war and that they have no links to the military or security organs.

Belarus, a close ally of Russia, has aided Moscow’s ongoing war on Kyiv – which has decimated large swathes of Ukraine and led to mass deaths and displacements – but is not a direct party to the war, which began more than a year ago.

In addition to the International Association of Athletics Federations, the International Equestrian Federation has recently also stuck to exclusion of Russian and Belarusian athletes from competitions.

In contrast, the president of the World Gymnastics Federation, Morinari Watanabe of Japan, spoke out in favor of their return and announced a decision on the matter in May. The International Wrestling Federation also supports readmission.

The German interior minister, however, wants to maintain a ban. "Offering Putin, the warmonger, a propaganda stage would betray all the values of sport," Faeser said.

"It is completely unacceptable for Ukrainian athletes to face athletes competing for a country that is killing so many civilians in Ukraine," she added.

However, Faeser ruled out a German boycott of the 2024 Olympics in Paris. "In doing so, we would harm our own athletes, who have worked towards this goal for a long time," she said.

The Ukrainian government, on the other hand, had ordered athletes from Ukraine to boycott all competitions, including the qualifications for the 2024 Olympics, in which athletes from Russia or Belarus participate.