JRL NEWSWATCH: “IOC wins as top Western nations agree to Russians in Paris” -Deutsche Welle
“… [Britain] … has joined France, Germany and the United States … accepting the International Olympic Committee’s plan for Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete in the Paris Olympics …. [T]he IOC and … International Paralympic Committee have decided that [those] athletes … can take part … as neutrals if they have not publicly supported the invasion of Ukraine and are not linked to the military. … A Ukrainian boycott … if Russians compete has long been floated … [T]hat stance … appears to have softened. … [T]he head of [Ukraine’s] Olympic committee has [said] Ukrainian athletes … should not stand next to Russians or shake their hands. Ukrainian activists have been busy trying to expose athletes who support the war or Russian military. Russia and Belarus have not ruled out preventing their own athletes from competing, but the chance to win medals even as neutrals is set to prove too tempting for … Putin and … Lukashenko. …”