Not everyone is welcome at Paris Games

UKRAINE’S Sports minister Matviy Bidny said he was monitoring the assessment of athletes considered eligible to compete in the Paris Olympics.

Visiting the city on April 2 and 3, the ex-wrestler who has occupied the post since November 2023, told Le Monde that Kyiv had not “definitively” ruled out a boycott of the Olympics which start on July 26 and continue until August 11.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) headquartered in Lausanne announced on March 19 that athletes from Russia and Belarus would be excluded from the opening ceremony.

Moscow reacted angrily, accusing the IOC of “descending into neo-Nazism”, while Kyiv maintained the restriction was insufficient.

Speaking during his time in Paris, Bidny made clear that Ukraine opposed Russian and Belarusian participation “in all sporting competitions.”

The Sports minister also visited five possible sites in the Ile-de-France area for the House of Ukraine which France has put forward in a bid to consolidate Ukraine’s presence during the Games.  All were “magnificent”, Bidny said, although Parc de la Villette, the base for Club France and Olympic committees from many other competing countries, appeared to be the preferred venue.

The Sports minister also found time to visit Institut National du Sport, de l’Expertise et de la Performance where France’s elite sportspeople train. It is located in Bois de Vincennes, which was heavily damaged during the Second World War and not completely restored until the 1990s.

He found this area inspiring, Bidny told Le Monde, adding that he saw it as a model for reconstructing Ukraine, much of whose infrastructure has been destroyed since the Russian invasion.