A total of 33 out of 59 athletes violated International Olympic Committee rules on participation in the Games, according to a 223-page report by the Hague-based organisation Global Rights Compliance.
Wayne Jordash, the body’s president and a human rights lawyer, said in June that the IOC had noted his letter expressing concern but would not discuss the matter on its merits and had ignored two other letters.
He said the IOC “is effectively sportswashing its position” by failing to properly apply the rules it has established that determine which Russian or Belarusian athletes can compete in Paris.
If they hadn’t come out with these principles and promoted them, then the IOC’s position would be less egregious.
The report mentions that 12 competitors have links to the armed and security forces through organisations such as the Central Sports Club of the Army, or CSKA. Last week, the IOC listed 59 Russian and Belarusian athletes invited to compete in Paris as neutrals and said 28 declined.
The committee set conditions for individual athletes from Russia and Belarus to compete as “neutral” participants, provided they did not “actively support the war in Ukraine.” The IOC said 330 Russians and 104 Belarusians were competing at the 2021 Tokyo Games.
Global Rights Compliance is sending its report to all 15 major Olympic sponsors, urging them to take a stand and pressure the IOC or reconsider their sponsorship of the Games, Jordash said.
France allocated €1.4bn to purify the Seine River. French President Emmanuel Macron and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo promised to take a dip in the Seine River to prove it is safe for the Olympics.
