Published by The i Paper (23rd February, 2026)
Last week, a Russian ski mountaineer called Nikita Filippov won a silver medal at the Winter Olympics in Italy. He was competing as a supposed neutral in punishment for his nation’s systematic cheating and then its sickening invasion of Ukraine. Yet his success was hailed back home. “He’s a true hero…defending the honour of his country,” declared one pro-Kremlin newspaper. And now their athletes, flags and national anthem are set to be welcomed back formally into the international sporting arena at the Paralympics, marking the disturbing end of Moscow’s sporting exile.
It is utterly grotesque to see the Paralympics being used to bring Russia in from the cold when this bloodstained regime has maimed so many innocent people – along with killing 650 athletes and coaches – in its horrific assault on Ukraine.
The timing of this move feels almost symbolic. On Tuesday, it will be four years since I stood on the balcony of my rented flat in Kyiv at dawn listening to the distressing sounds of missiles striking a peaceful capital city in Europe, marking the start of the full-scale invasion that has wrecked so many lives, cities and homes in the Kremlin’s failed genocidal attempt to crush a free nation.
Moscow’s Paralympic teams include at least 30 soldiers wounded in this stupid war (although none will reportedly compete in these games). No wonder disclosure of its involvement has sparked outrage in Kyiv as their soldiers fight along a 700-mile front line carving through their country to resist waves of Russian forces and families shiver in freezing homes after a barrage of attacks on civilian energy infrastructure. Especially after the buffoons on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) barred one of their own athletes from competing in the skeleton for the “offence” of refusing to remove his helmet honouring some compatriots killed in this cruellest of conflicts.
This is a significant move since sport, with all its soft-power strength, does not exist in a vacuum. As George Orwell famously said, “it is war minus the shooting” and wrapped up in nationalism. Even fresh claims that the current head of Moscow’s anti-doping agency participated in the state-sanctioned doping scheme exposed after the 2014 Sochi Olympics has not deterred the push to end Russia’s pariah status.
IOC president Kirsty Coventry says sport should be a “neutral ground” where athletes can “compete freely, without being held back by the politics or divisions of their governments”. She follows Gianni Infantino, president of Fifa, who demanded Russia’s return to international football contests on the absurd basis that its exile just created “more frustration and hatred”.
Like so many top global officials in sport, these are gruesome characters. Coventry was a minister in Zimbabwe’s brutal and corrupt government following her glorious swimming career, controversially taking state handouts of cash and land. Infantino is the sycophantic creep who created a Fifa peace award to give Donald Trump in lieu of his desired Nobel prize, then rushed to support the US President’s so-called Board of Peace with an offer of cash to rebuild shattered Gaza.
Some international sporting bodies, such as judo, have ended bans on Russia already while the IOC wants Russia to compete at this summer’s Youth Olympic Games in Senegal. And note how Paolo Zampolli, Trump’s special representative for global partnerships, endorses Russia’s return to the international stage, declaring that “sport is for all”, thus paving the way for Russia to compete at the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028.
Here is the key that unlocks the reason why sport is being used to detoxify a regime guilty of grotesque war crimes, from slaughtering civilians through to the stealing of children. The world’s superpower and our closest ally – which for decades paid at least lip service to the fight for freedom – has switched sides under Trump, giving this move the green light.
The US is run by a narcissistic fool who shows contempt for democracy at home and abroad, abandoning Ukraine despite its astonishing fight for survival. So we witness a shameless White House that panders to Russia’s lethal dictator Vladimir Putin, turns on its friends in Europe and tries to force Kyiv’s leader Volodymyr Zelensky to concede heavily fortified sovereign land to their despised foe in order for America to monetise a peace deal dictated by the Kremlin.
Much of Europe has, thankfully, begun to wake up from slumber that led to alarming complacency over Russian aggression. It is filling the void caused by the ending of US military support, led largely by Britain and Germany, to thwart any capitulation while slowly beefing up its own defences. For all the talk about Russian advances and possible Ukrainian collapse due to manpower shortages, Zelensky said on Friday that his forces have liberated 300 square kilometres of land in recent days – almost certainly aided by Elon Musk shutting down illicit Russian use of his Starlink internet terminals. Meanwhile his new defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov suggests they are now inflicting more casualties on Moscow than even its flint-hearted leaders can replace – and he aims to increase that number from 35,000 to 50,000 a month.
Zelensky has attacked the Paralympic move to partially readmit Russia, along with its lackey Belarus, as a “dirty decision” that flies in the face of European values. He is absolutely right – but these liberal values are under assault too, including from the US. Britain joined 33 other countries and the European Commission to condemn the Games’ organisers. Italy, host of the Winter Olympics, is demanding reversal of the decision. Some Eastern European nations that have suffered Moscow’s repression in the past are joining Ukraine to boycott the 6 March opening ceremony in Verona.
Yet, ultimately, we see sport serve again as a metaphor for life. It shows the growing isolation of Europe and a handful of decent allies in support of Ukraine’s noble struggle on the frontline of a brutal global fight between autocracy and democracy. And it is essential for our continent that Kyiv remains undefeated in this battle.