LAUSANNE — Olympic chiefs announced Tuesday that Russian and Belarusian athletes competing under a neutral flag at this summer’s Paris Games will not be allowed to participate in the opening ceremony.
Individual neutral athletes (AIN) from both countries “will not participate in the parade of delegations and teams during the opening ceremony because they are individual athletes,” IOC director James Macleod said after the International Olympic Committee’s executive board meeting in Lausanne.
“But they will be given the opportunity to experience the event,” Macleod added.
The AINs will be on site, he said, but will not be included as passengers in the July 26 Seine River Boat Parade.
Macleod said the scenario mirrored that of the 1992 games for “independent Olympic participants” from the former Yugoslavia in Barcelona.
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“The decision on the participation of AINs in the closing ceremony will be taken later, taking into account that the closing ceremony is not entered by teams, but by all athletes together.”
Athletes from both Russia and Belarus have already been banned from the opening ceremony of the Paralympics, which begin in Paris on August 28, just over two weeks after the Olympics end.
The IOC suspended Russia from the 2024 Games in December, but gave the green light for Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete as neutrals as long as they did not actively support the war in Ukraine.
