The International Olympic Committee has informed that it has launched a formal investigation into the case involving the 24-year-old Belarusian sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya who did not take part in the 200 meters of athletics after being forced to board a flight to Minsk after her criticisms of her country’s national team for having deployed her in the 4×400 relay without her opinion.
IOC spokesman Mark Adamas said, “we have to establish all the facts, it takes time but in the meantime our first concern is for the athlete”. The IOC awaits a report from the Belarusian Olympic Committee on the whole affair.
Tsimanouskaya had openly complained that the leaders and coaches of Belarus had included her, without her opinion, in the quartet of the 4×400 relay. “Our leaders always decide for us but everyone prepares for their own specialty and puts all their efforts into preparing for their own race …”, Tsimanouskaya wrote on Instagram. The Belarusian sprinter was forced to leave Tokyo and board a flight to Minsk but she applied for, and obtained, a humanitarian visa from Poland at the Polish embassy in the Japanese capital.
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