Ukrainian officials will boycott next month’s Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Paralympic Games after the International Paralympic Committee approved the participation of a small group of Russian and Belarusian athletes under their national flags. Sports Minister Matvii Bidnyi condemned the move as “outrageous”, arguing that allowing the symbols of countries waging war on Ukraine onto the Paralympic stage effectively endorses aggression and Kremlin propaganda.
Under the IPC decision, six Russian and four Belarusian athletes will compete at the Games in Italy, marking the first time since the 2014 Sochi Paralympics that the Russian flag will be flown at a Paralympic event. Russia and Belarus had been largely excluded from international para sport following Moscow’s full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but member federations voted in September 2025 to lift their partial suspensions and restore full membership rights.
Kyiv responded by announcing a political and diplomatic boycott rather than a sporting withdrawal, saying Ukrainian athletes will still compete but no government or official delegation will attend the March 6–15 Games, opening ceremony in Verona or any formal Paralympic events. Bidnyi urged “partners from the free world” to join the protest by shunning protocol activities in solidarity with Ukraine.
Ukrainian Paralympic officials stressed they do not want to punish their own athletes, many of whom have been directly affected by the war, and therefore stopped short of a full team boycott. However, they insist the IPC must reverse course, apologise and reconsider what Kyiv describes as a dangerous precedent of normalising the Russian flag on a global stage while the invasion continues.
The decision has also drawn criticism from some European officials; the European Union’s sports commissioner Glenn Micallef has said he will skip the opening ceremony in protest. Meanwhile, Russian para sport officials have welcomed the ruling as a step towards full reintegration, while Ukrainian athletes such as skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych say the wider Olympic and Paralympic movement is “running a campaign against the Ukrainian nation” by punishing those who visibly highlight victims of the war.
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