IOC EB takes provisional measures against NOC of Belarus Further to its decision of 25 November to start a formal procedure vis-à-vis the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Belarus, and taking into consideration all the allegations and elements gathered during this ongoing investigation, the Executive Board (EB) of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) today adopted a number of provisional measures. They are applicable until further notice or until such time as a new NOC Executive Board is elected in February 2021 by the NOC General Assembly. In view of the allegations and elements received by the IOC and the responses provided by the NOC of Belarus, the IOC has come to the conclusion that it appears that the current NOC leadership has not appropriately protected the Belarusian athletes from political discrimination within the NOC, their member sports federations or the sports movement. This is contrary to the fundamental principles of the Olympic Charter, and therefore seriously affects the reputation of the Olympic Movement. The EB decided to: 1. Exclude the currently elected members of the Executive Board of the NOC of Belarus from all IOC events and activities, including the Olympic Games. This includes in particular Mr Alexander Lukashenko, in his capacity as NOC President and legal representative of the NOC; Mr Viktor Lukashenko, in his capacity as NOC First Vice-President and the person responsible for the NOCs operations and activities on a daily basis; and Mr Dmitry Baskov, in his capacity as an NOC Executive Board member and in view of the specific allegations raised against him. This provision is not applicable to Mrs Tatiana Drozdovskaya, as she is an ex-officio athletes representative on the Executive Board. 2. Suspend all financial payments to the NOC of Belarus, with the exception of payments related to the preparations of the Belarusian athletes for, and their participation in, the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 and Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022. All Olympic scholarships for Belarusian athletes will now be paid directly to the athletes, and no longer through the NOC. 3. Request the relevant International Federations to make sure that all eligible Belarusian athletes can take part in qualification events for the upcoming Olympic Games without any political discrimination. 4. Suspend any discussions with the NOC of Belarus regarding the hosting of future IOC events. 5. Request all constituents of the Olympic Movement to respect these measures in the interest of protecting Belarusian athletes rights and the reputation of the Olympic Movement. The IOC EB will to continue to monitor the situation and reserves the right to consider any further action or to remove any of these provisional measures depending on the evolution of the situation. The full decision can be found here. ### The International Olympic Committee is a not-for-profit, civil, non-governmental, international organisation made up of volunteers which is committed to building a better world through sport. It redistributes more than 90 per cent of its income to the wider sporting movement, which means that every day the equivalent of USD 3.4 million goes to help athletes and sports organisations at all levels around the world. ### For more information, please contact the IOC Media Relations Team: Tel: +41 21 621 6000, email: pressoffice@olympic.org, or visit our web site at www.olympic.org. Broadcast quality footage The IOC Newsroom: http://iocnewsroom.com/ Videos YouTube: www.youtube.com/iocmedia Photos For an extensive selection of photos available shortly after each event, please follow us on Flickr. To request archive photos and footage, please contact our Images team at: images@olympic.org. |