(Reuters) – World Athletics will implement further sanctions against the member federation of Belarus following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the ruling body’s President Sebastian Coe said on Thursday.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has led to sanctions across global sport, and Belarus, a key staging area for the full-scale invasion, has also been punished.
World Athletics initially responded by banning the two countries’ athletes, support staff and officials from all events for the foreseeable future, and following a Council meeting it decided to impose harsher sanctions on Belarus.
“These sanctions include no hosting of any international or European athletics events,” Coe told a news conference. “No representation at congress or in decisions which require congressional votes.
“No accreditation to attend any world athletics events and no involvement of federation personnel in any official World athletics development, or professional programmes.”
The Russian Athletics Federation has been suspended from World Athletics since 2015 due to doping violations, and its competitors have not been allowed to compete under the country’s flag at international events.
“None of us came in the sport to prevent athletes from competing, but this is of such a different scale,” Coe said.
“The council was unanimous about the view that it would be inconceivable to have athletes from Ukraine being excluded for … being unable to compete or train, in an environment that is beyond compare, and have athletes from the two aggressor nations being given the full panoply.
“In the past I’ve railed against sport being used singularly as a tool. But here, the answer is very clear. Everybody is now doing what they can to stand shoulder to shoulder and sport needs to do that as well.”
(Reporting by Aadi Nair in Bengaluru, editing by Ed Osmond)
