The International Olympic Committee (IOC) published its latest list of neutral athletes with 2021 US Open tennis champion Daniil Medvedev and world number 22 Ekaterina Alexandrova.
Tokyo women’s doubles gold medalist Andrey Rublev, as well as fellow tennis players Daria Kasatkina and Anna Kalinskaya, were among 12 Russians and Belarusians who turned down invitations to compete as neutral athletes at the Paris Olympics.
Athletes from Russia and Belarus, Moscow’s closest allies in its 2022 invasion of Ukraine, are barred from the Paris Olympics except for a few who will compete as neutrals without flags or anthems.
READ ALSO : Naomi Osaka agrees to represent Japan at the 2024 Paris Olympics
The athletes have been carefully vetted by an IOC panel to ensure they have no ties to the military.
Russia condemned the restrictions as discriminatory. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the IOC was slipping “into racism and neo-Nazism.”
Russian Tennis Federation head Shamil Tarpishchev said last month that Rublev would miss the Olympics for health reasons. Tokyo women’s singles silver medalists Karen Khachanov and Liudmila Samsonova have also turned down the opportunity to play.
US Belarusian tennis player Victoria Azarenka, who won doubles gold and singles bronze in London in 2012, has accepted the invitation.
Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka, also of Belarus, has yet to accept or decline, but she withdrew from Wimbledon on Monday due to a shoulder injury.
Gymnast Ivan Litvinovich, who won gold for Belarus in the trampoline event in Tokyo three years ago, and Russian canoeist Alexey Korovashkov, a bronze medalist in London, are also among the athletes who have accepted IOC invitations.
The Paris Olympics take place from July 26-August 11, with the tennis tournament taking place from July 27-August 4 at Roland Garros, home of the French Open.
Speaking before the opening match at Indian Wells on Friday, Daniil Medvedev said he was looking forward to playing at the Olympics after a positive experience in Tokyo three years ago when he reached the quarter-finals of the singles competition.
“If I could, I would be there,” Daniil Medvedev told reporters. “I will play in singles and doubles.
“When I was in Tokyo, it was an incredible experience. It was probably one of the greatest memories of my sporting life, which surprised me because in tennis, we tend to think that Grand Slams are more important.
“Regarding the neutral flag, I will follow the rules. If it is under a neutral flag, I will play under a neutral flag and I will try to compete there, show good tennis and try to win, for sure,” concluded Daniil Medvedev.
