Alireza Abbasi, an international figure in the world of sports science, reacted strongly to the positions of Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee, towards some countries.
Alireza Abbasi, the Director of Sports of the World Innovators of Nations and an international figure in the world of sports science, reacted strongly to the positions of Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee, towards some countries.
Is the suspension of the National Olympic Committee of a country that violates the Olympic Charter and belongs to a country that violates international law and at the same time allows politically neutral athletes to participate in international sporting events the way that sports should respond to war?
The current practice of the International Olympic Committee and international sports federations in this regard reveals fundamental ambiguities: there is an urgent need to define the circumstances under which the International Olympic Committee may exercise the sanctions options provided by the Olympic Charter against National Olympic Committees (and indirectly against States that violate international law).
The failure of the International Olympic Committee to apply sanctions in the conflict between Israel and Hamas due to the different circumstances highlights the importance of clarifying this difference and setting standards. On the other hand, if the control of individual neutrality is compared with collective exclusion, it must oscillate between two objectives: if compared with a collective exclusion, the control of neutrality is only effective in protecting the rights of athletes from the victim State if the conditions of neutrality are strictly monitored by the International Olympic Committee.
Regarding the Russian invitation to the Paris Olympics, an investigation published by the Babel media agency reportedly uncovered control flaws.
The “completely different reactions to Russia’s actions in Ukraine and Israel’s actions in Gaza” suggests that the IOC has aligned itself with “the political positions of the global North.”
The global Web-Song movement launched a petition calling for Israel to be banned from the Olympics (allowing Israeli athletes to compete but not under the Israeli flag) to show that “the mass killing of civilians will not be tolerated by the international community.”
In the absence of a written standard, the application of the rules is very much like the freedom of states to respond to conflicts. The sanctions that the IOC or international sports federations decide to impose seem to be part of the political leverage of the world of sport – and part of the IOC’s discretion.
