The project is being carried out in collaboration with Global Athletes (Canada), Athletes for Ukraine (Ukraine), and the Open Society Foundation (USA). The verification process will run from June 4 to August 15.
We spoke with Alyaksandr Apeikin, Executive Director of the Belarusian Fund for Sports Solidarity (BSSF), about the neutrality criteria for Belarusian athletes, who will receive the collected information, what the Belarusian Fund for Sports Solidarity is currently working on, and whether they are prepared to assist with organizing the 2036 Olympics in Poland:
RR: Why is the procedure for verifying Belarusian athletes being conducted before this year’s Olympics in Paris? Who initiated it? What does the process look like?
– The thing is, the International Olympic Committee has established a commission that handles the verification of this neutrality status. There are criteria set by the International Olympic Committee for neutrality. Firstly, the athlete must be independent of the state. They represent not the state but themselves as individuals. The athlete does not use state symbols, which includes the national anthem, state emblems, or anything related to the official state. And thirdly, and most importantly, the athlete should not be affiliated with any military or militaristic structures, meaning the Ministry of Internal Affairs. There should be no signs of support for the war in Ukraine. The issue is that this commission within the International Olympic Committee is very opaque. We know who is on the commission, but we do not know how they will conduct this process. Therefore, we have created this initiative with several organizations. This includes the organization “Ukrainian Athletes,” the Canadian organization “Global Athlete,” and with the support of the “Open Society Foundations,” we have established a public commission, a public oversight body. From our side, an independent analysis of neutrality will take place. In other words, we will conduct this process ourselves, involving independent experts and public experts. Essentially, this will be a classic fact-checking process, where Belarusian athletes hold 28 licenses, while Russian athletes, if I’m not mistaken, hold 57 or 58. We will check each athlete for compliance with these neutrality criteria and then send our results to the International Olympic Committee. Thus, we will act as a public expert body. We will also publish the information we have.
In an interview with “Guest of Racja” – Alyaksandr Apeikin, Executive Director of the Belarusian Fund for Sports Solidarity (BSSF), communicated by Volha Syamashka.
The Belarusian Fund for Sports Solidarity requests that any relevant information about athletes that may assist in the verification process be sent via Telegram bot: @bssfbot
Belarusian Radio Racja