00:01The European Commissioner for Sport has condemned the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes in the Milan-Kotina Paralympic Games
00:09under their national flags.
00:11Glenn Mikhelev has announced a boycott of the opening ceremony for that reason.
00:15While Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine continues, I cannot support the reinstatement of national symbols, flags, anthems and uniforms
00:24that are inseparable from that conflict he wrote on X.
00:27Russians and Belarusians have been prohibited from competing under their flags in the Olympics and Paralympics since Russia's full-scale
00:36invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
00:38They are, however, allowed to participate as individual neutral athletes, a category that allows people who have qualified for the
00:48Games to join the competition under certain conditions such as not actively supporting the invasion and not being contracted to
00:56the Russian or Belarusian military or national security agencies.
01:01These conditions were applied in Paris 2024 and are also the rules for the current Milan-Kotina Olympics, with 13
01:09Russian and 7 Belarusian athletes participating in the competition.
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