Up to IOC to decide if Russia competes, head of Paris Olympics says

Ukraine has stepped up efforts to lobby international sports leaders against Russian participation in next year’s Paris Olympics as indications mount that the games could see the biggest boycott since the Cold War.

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[Hayastantzi]

Boycotting is Cowardly, if you don’t want a Country competing then Withdraw yourself like a coward instead of whining

[Lamin_G]

Indeed, the IOC better think this one through very carefully, if it is do any inkling of justice to its self-professed *apolitical* status.

I'll just recap what I noted elsewhere:

The IOC saying that Russia and Belarus are entitled to compete as long as athletes "are not represented by a flag" is a joke given that stripping athletes off flag representation has often been punishment for _violation of "sporting rules, "_ not for _settling "geopolitical spats."_ And, yet, the IOC parades itself as *apolitical* when it has been caught politicizing the games on numerous occasions.

As for Zelenskyy's notion that allowing Russia and Belarus to compete in the Olympics sends the wrong message that "brutal military aggression is okay, " where was that sentiment when European nations where colonizing all corners of the globe, or during NATO-U.S. invasions of Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, etc., or during the ongoing illegal Israeli intrusions into Palestinian west bank settlements? Was the IOC not sending the "wrong message" then by allowing representation of nations guilty of brutal military aggression? Maybe the expectation is that the IOC should have double standards based on which offending countries can exert the threat of monetary blackmail and which can't.