Interfax: Russian Olympic Committee says gay hysteria over Sochi Games ‘whipped up’

File Photo of Sochi Olympics Banner Near Highway in Warm Weather with Vehicle and Cyclicsts Nearby

(Interfax – Sochi, November 8, 2013) The Russian Olympic Committee thinks the scandal around the sportsmen of non-traditional sexual orientation is artificially whipped up, while the athletes themselves will be taken up with a competition, not political issues.
“I think that is just the whipping up of the atmosphere around the Olympics on purpose; when the Games start, the athletes will have no time to think about anything else, they will live with the Games. When you come to perform and, moreover, to win, you are preoccupied with completely different thoughts,” the honorary vice-president of the Russian Olympic Committee, Vladimir Vasin, told Interfax news agency on Friday.

Answering the question on the possible attempts of some Games participants to unfurl a flag of the LGBT community at the opening and closing ceremonies of the Sochi Olympics, Vasin said:

“I don’t think something alike will take place. We received no such appeals.” Vasin recalled that the Russian side has provided the corresponding guarantees of personal privacy for the Games participants. “As far as the guarantees from the Russian side are concerned, they were voiced earlier, that is each person’s private business,” he said.

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