By Julien Pretot
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 18 (Reuters) – Allowing six Russian athletes to participate in next month’s Milano Cortina Paralympics with their flag and anthem is outrageous and a sign of support for Russia’s propaganda, Ukraine’s sports minister said on Wednesday.
Russia and Belarus will have a combined 10 para athletes at next month’s Paralympics following Tuesday’s decision by the International Paralympic Committee.
Both countries were banned from Paralympic competitions after Moscow’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, but regained full membership rights in the IPC after member organisations voted in September 2025 to lift their partial suspensions. Belarus was a key staging area for the invasion.
International federations for each sport on the Paralympic Games programme had said they would maintain bans on athletes from those countries, but Russia and Belarus won an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport in December against the International Ski and Snowboard Federation, earning a handful of spots.
MINISTER CONDEMNS DECISION
A limited number of Russian and Belarus athletes are competing as independent neutral athletes without flags or anthems at the ongoing Milano Cortina Winter Games, with the Olympic Committees of the two nations still sanctioned by the International Olympic Committee.
“The decision by the Paralympic organisers to allow killers and their accomplices to take part in the Paralympic Games under national flags is disappointing and outrageous,” Ukrainian minister Matvii Bidnyi said on social media.
“Giving them a platform means giving a voice to war propaganda. When the russian (sic) flag is raised on the international stage, it becomes part of russia’s (sic) propaganda machine,” he said.
Russia will have two spots in Para alpine skiing, two in Para cross-country skiing and two in Para snowboard while Belarus were awarded four slots in total, all in cross-country skiing – one male and three female.
“The flags of russia and belarus have no place at international sporting events that stand for fairness, integrity, and respect. These are the flags of regimes that have turned sport into a tool of war, lies, and contempt,” Bidnyi said.
HERASKEVYCH SPEAKS OUT
His comments come hours after Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych, who was disqualified from the Winter Olympics over a helmet depicting Ukrainian athletes killed in the war, criticised Games organisers’ decision to have a Russian volunteer carry a sign ahead of the Ukraine delegation at the opening ceremony.
The volunteer, a Russian living in Milan, had wanted to carry the sign because she condemned Russia’s invasion and wanted to support Ukraine, according to local media.
“It looks like some campaign against the Ukrainian nation, and it feels like that. They try to make provocations at any point,” Heraskevych told Reuters from Kyiv.
“And I don’t want to attack anyone personally, but overall this situation with the Paralympic Committee, with the IOC, with the disqualification and with Russian flags, feels like the IOC is doing some campaign against the Ukrainian nation.”
The IOC said there was no discrimination against any nation or athlete at the Games in Italy. All decisions relating to Heraskevych were driven by the rules of the Olympic Charter that limit any expression on the fields of play, it said.
“We asked them (all athletes) for that specific moment, that field of play moment to be free of any messages,” IOC spokesman Mark Adams told the same press conference. “We ask that from any country, from any athlete, from anywhere in the world.”
He said he was aware of the sign bearer, but said: “We don’t closely vet all of our volunteers but a Russian volunteer carrying a sign, for me it is not an issue. Tell me differently.”
Luca Casassa, Milano Games spokesman, told the same press conference there were more than 1,200 volunteers at the opening ceremony. “They worked to make the opening ceremony something unique. We cannot vet each and every volunteer,” he said.
(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Writing by Karolos Grohmann; Editing by Alison Williams)
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