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By Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber, Karolos Grohmann and Chang-Ran Kim
TOKYO (Reuters) -A Belarusian athlete who refused to board a flight https://www.reuters.com/way of life/sports activities/exclusive-olympics-belarusian-athlete-says-she-was-taken-airport-go-home-after-2021-08-01 after she mentioned she was taken to the airport by her crew in opposition to her needs was “secure and safe” in Tokyo, the Worldwide Olympic Committee mentioned on Monday.
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, 24, spent the evening in an airport lodge after she went to Japanese police at Haneda airport in search of safety late on Sunday, IOC spokesperson Mark Adams informed a media convention. Various businesses had been involved with the sprinter, together with the United Nations Excessive Commissioner for Refugees, he added.
In a brewing diplomatic incident, it was unclear the place Tsimanouskaya would find yourself with each Poland and the Czech Republic publicly providing her help.
“She has assured us she is secure and safe. We’re speaking once more to her this morning to grasp what the following steps will likely be,” Adams mentioned. “We have to take heed to her, discover out what she desires and assist her in her resolution.”
The sprinter, who was as a result of race within the 200 metre heats at Olympic Stadium on Monday, had her Video games minimize brief when she mentioned she was taken to the airport to board a Turkish Airways flight.
She informed a Reuters reporter through Telegram that the Belarusian head coach had turned up at her room on Sunday on the athletes village and informed her she needed to go away.
“The top coach came visiting to me and mentioned there had been an order from above to take away me,” she wrote within the message. “At 5 (pm) they got here my room and informed me to pack and so they took me to the airport.”
However she refused to board the flight, telling Reuters: “I can’t return to Belarus.”
The Belarusian Olympic Committee mentioned in a press release coaches had determined to withdraw Tsimanouskaya from the Video games on docs’ recommendation about her “emotional, psychological state”.
Belarus athletics head coach Yuri Moisevich informed state tv he “might see there was one thing incorrect together with her… She both secluded herself or did not wish to discuss.”
The IOC would proceed conversations with Tsimanouskaya on Monday and the Olympics governing physique had requested for a full report from the Belarus’ Olympic committee, Adams mentioned.
In response to a lot of questions by journalists about what the IOC would do to make sure different athletes within the village had been protected, the IOC spokesperson mentioned they had been nonetheless amassing particulars about what precisely occurred.
SEEKING ASYLUM
A member of the native Belarusian neighborhood, who had been involved with the athlete all through the evening, informed Reuters that after lengthy talks with numerous officers she had petitioned for asylum in Japan.
The Japanese authorities mentioned the athlete had been saved secure whereas Tokyo 2020 organisers and the IOC checked her intentions.
“Japan is coordinating with related events and proceed to take applicable motion,” mentioned chief cupboard secretary Katsunobu Kato.
Each Poland and the Czech Republic supplied their assistance on Monday.
Polish international ministry official Marcin Przydacz wrote on Twitter https://twitter.com/marcin_przydacz/standing/1421908856377065474 that Tsimanouskaya has been “supplied a humanitarian visa and is free to pursue her sporting profession in Poland if she so chooses.”
Poland’s Olympic committee didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
Czech international minister Jakub Kulhanek mentioned he thought-about the scenario across the Belarusian “scandalous.”
“The Czech Republic is able to assist,” he tweeted. “We’re providing her a visa to enter the territory in order that she will apply for worldwide safety with us. Our embassy in Tokyo can also be prepared to assist.”
Tsimanouskaya’s refusal to board the airplane, first reported by Reuters, highlighted discord in Belarus, a former Soviet state that’s run with a decent grip by President Alexander Lukashenko.
On Monday, the IOC spokesperson mentioned it had taken a lot of actions in opposition to Belarus’ Olympic Committee within the run as much as the Video games following nationwide protests within the nation.
In March, the IOC refused to recognise https://www.reuters.com/way of life/sports activities/olympics-ioc-does-not-recognise-lukashenko-sons-belarus-olympic-vote-2021-03-08 the election of Lukashenko’s son Viktor as head of the nation’s Olympic Committee. Each father and son had been banned from attending the Video games in December.
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