France agrees IOC will take final call on Russian, Belarus participation in Paris Olympics

Paris, June 9 (IANS) The preparations for next year's Olympics and the participation of contingents from Russia and Belarus in Paris 2024 were the main topics of discussion when International Olympic Committee (IOC) Thomas Bach met French President Emmanuel Macron here.

While both leaders expressed their full support to the Organising Committee for Paris 2024 Olympic Games, they also reaffirmed that the decision regarding the participation of Russian and Belarus athletes will be left to the IOC, to be taken at a later date.

The IOC President Thomas Bach was welcomed by French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday at the Élysée Palace in Paris.

The two leaders discussed the preparations for the Olympic Games Paris 2024, which are going extremely well. President Bach and President Macron expressed their full support for the Organising Committee and its President, Olympic champion Tony Estanguet, who also attended the meeting, the IOC informed in a release late on Thursday.

The Olympic Games Paris 2024 will be Games of a new era, taking the reforms of the Olympic Agenda 2020 and Olympic Agenda 2020+5 fully into account."

"The "Games"wide open" slogan will fully come to life at these Games. Paris 2024 will be the most inclusive Olympic Games, the most urban Olympic Games, the youngest Olympic Games, the most sustainable Olympic Games and the most gender-balanced Olympic Games in history, with full parity of female and male athletes," the IOC said.

President Bach thanked President Macron for the recent declaration at the G7 Summit in Hiroshima, Japan, concerning the autonomy of sport and the conditions for the participation of athletes with a Russian or Belarussian passport, in alignment with the respective recommendations of the IOC.

"In addition, they reaffirmed that the decision on the participation of these athletes at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 will be taken by the IOC at the appropriate time and that they will continue to cooperate in this respect, too," the IOC informed.

The IOC has currently suspended Russian and Belarus from the Olympic movement over the war in Ukraine. Russian and Belarus sportspersons participated in the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 under the IOC flag. As of now, the IOC has not lifted the suspension of the two National Olympic Committees but will allow participants from the two countries as neutrals.

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