Olympic champion suggests London should be bombed for Russia sanctions to end
Yelena Valbe, a three-time Olympic champion, suggests a bomb would need to be dropped on London in order to lift Russia’s sporting sanctions.
Russian athletes have not competed under their nation’s name, flag and anthem since the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, initially due to widespread doping violations.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russia and Belarus were banned by the International Olympic Committee and athletes from the two nations were forced to compete as Individual Neutral Athletes (AIN) at the Olympics in Paris this summer.
In football, adult Russian teams at club and international level remain barred from competing in FIFA and UEFA competitions in response to the invasion of Ukraine, while tennis players from Russia and Belarus, including Aryna Sabalenka and Daniil Medvedev, signed declarations of neutrality before being allowed to play.
In an interview with News.ru, Valbe, who is currently the head of the Russian Skiing Federation, was asked what she felt needed to happen in order for Russia to be fully reinstated at the Olympics and other international sport events.
‘I will probably say things that should not be said at all. It seems to me that if we had thrown a bomb on the centre of London everything would have ended by now, we would have been allowed everywhere,’ she replied.
‘Russia’s struggle with the entire outside world has been going on for centuries.
‘They have never loved us, even when they pretended to love us. They always stand with a sharpened weapon behind their back. I love it when our country is strong and, probably, our strength irritates the whole world.’
Valbe, won three Olympic gold medals in cross-country skiing, was also adamant that Russia’s exile from international sporting competitions will not last.
‘There’s no need to guess but sooner or later they’ll let us in anyway. They also have nowhere to go because this cannot go on forever,’ she said.
‘If a year ago I said that we would be returned after the end of the SVO [Russia’s term for its invasion of Ukraine], now I understand that even after the end of the SVO, nothing will happen quickly.
‘It will take more than one year to return to the international arena.’
Valbe’s comments have received a negative reception in Russia, as Dmitry Guberniev, one of the nation’s most prominent sports television presenters, said: ‘Normal people should now run away from her like from the plague.
‘I want to say that the skiers of the Russian national team, especially the young ones, are simply horrified and shocked by some of Valbe’s statements.’
Svetlana Zhurova, a Russian Olympic speed skating champion, said: ‘I would be more careful with such jokes.
‘With such statements, she sets the western world against herself. She was joking, but it is not always understood. For some reason, they do not understand such humour there.’
Former heavyweight champion boxer, Nikolai Valuev, who was beaten by David Haye in 2009 in a title fight billed as ‘David vs Goliath’, did not agree with Valbe’s proposal but suggested the absence of Britain would decrease the world’s problems.
‘If we imagine that in any of the six previous centuries that Britain suddenly sank to the bottom of the sea then for the rest of the world, for a certain time, there would indeed be a sharp decrease in problems, here Valbe is right,’ Valuev, who is now a pro-Putin politician in Russia, told Sport24.
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