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≡ IPC NEWS CONFERENCE ≡
International Paralympic Committee President Andrew Parsons (BRA) thought that the vote at the IPC General Assembly last September had ended questions about the re-admission of Russia and Belarus.
But it didn’t and he told reporters at a Thursday news conference in Milan, “yes, we were surprised to see that it has exploded again.”
IPC Chief Brand and Communications Officer Craig Spence (GBR) explained that for the Friday opening in Verona:
“Let me be very clear on the NPCs [National Paralympic Committees] who are not coming for political reasons. We have Czechia, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Ukraine.
“At the moment, the IPC is aware of seven National Paralympic Committees that are not coming for political reasons. We respect that decision.”
He also noted:
“Canada, Great Britain, Germany, France: they’re not boycotting the ceremony. They told us that they are not coming for performance reasons.”
Spence said that some of the selected flagbearers could not attend the ceremony since they had competitions beginning at 9:30 the following morning. So, during the opening, all of the actual flagbearers will be volunteers.
As for the Ukrainian “map” uniforms that were rejected:
“We have uniform guidelines for each Paralympic Games.
“Those uniform guidelines say that things like lyrics, slogans, mottos from your country are prohibited, and that includes maps.
“This piece of uniform in particular from Ukraine was presented to us in the middle of January.
“We went back and said, ‘I’m sorry, but this is in breach of the rules’. If any of the National Paralympic Committees had come to us with a piece of kit that featured within it a map of their borders, their country, we had the same answer. It was ‘No, can you change it?’.
“We had some great dialogue with NPC Ukraine. They said ‘Thank you for the feedback’. Within 24 hours, they provided us with an alternative design, and we approved it within 30 minutes. So, for us, that was cleared up three months ago.”
Parsons emphasized that even with the Russia-Ukraine war ongoing and the new conflicts in the Middle East, the purpose of the Paralympic Games means it need to go on:
“These Games are about sport, but not only sport. These Games are about inclusion, about 1.3 billion persons with disability out there.
“Sport is what we’re trying to protect here in these Games. Sport is our main focus here. It’s about the more than 600 athletes in six sports of a record number of nations. This will remain our focus. This and the message of it.”
Parsons said that the 612 qualifers for the 2026 Winter Games, from 56 national committees is a record, and that National Paralympic Committee athletes from El Salvador, Haiti, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Portugal will make their Winter Paralympic debut.
The Winter Paralympic opening will be shown on USA Network and NBC’s Peacock streaming service beginning at 1:30 p.m. Eastern time on Friday.
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