Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych holds his crash helmet as he stands outdoors the sliding heart on the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, Thursday.
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Alessandra Tarantino/AP
KYIV — Ukrainians are uniting in help and solidarity with their skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych after he was banned Thursday from the Milan Cortina Video games. He insisted on sporting a helmet with photographs of Ukrainian athletes killed throughout Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and was disqualified for refusing the Worldwide Olympic Committee’s request that he substitute it.
“That is worth of our dignity,” Heraskevych wrote on Instagram after studying he had been disqualified.
Ukrainians supported him by posting photographs on social media with the caption “Remembrance will not be a violation,” referring to the IOC choice that portraits of these killed in warfare constituted a political assertion that’s prohibited on the Olympics.
Ukraine’s Vladyslav Heraskevych begins for a males’s skeleton coaching session on the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, Wednesday.
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Aijaz Rahi/AP
Amongst these displaying solidarity with the athlete have been numerous Ukrainian troopers, taking help photographs on the entrance line.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked the athlete, writing that his helmet is “a reminder to the entire world of what Russian aggression is and what the worth of the battle for independence is.”
Later Zelenskyy awarded the skeleton racer the Order of Liberty, saying it was “For selfless service to the Ukrainian folks, civic braveness and patriotism in upholding the beliefs of freedom and democratic values.”
Ukraine is about to enter its fifth yr of the full-scale warfare and is experiencing its hardest winter with frigid climate and fixed Russian assaults on the nation’s vitality services.
The evening earlier than Heraskevych was disqualified, Russia launched one other large assault on the facility grid.
The European Union Ambassador to Ukraine, Katarina Mathernova, mentioned she was offended and dissatisfied when she discovered concerning the Ukrainian athlete being excluded.
“This yr’s Olympics actually didn’t cease Russia. It assaults Ukraine on daily basis. Once more this evening they broken one other thermal energy plant. In Kyiv, one other 2,600 residential buildings have been left with out heating — making it 3,700 excessive rises with out warmth. Not less than six folks have been injured, together with a four-year-old youngster in Dnipro,” Mathernova wrote on Fb.
Some 660 Ukrainian athletes and coaches have been killed for the reason that starting of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, in response to Zelenskyy.
“UKR heroes with us”
Ukrainian fencer and two-time Olympic champion Olga Kharlan wrote on Fb that Heraskevych’s place is about dignity, reminiscence and respect for these “who won’t ever have the ability to compete once more.” Kharlan herself skilled disqualification — in 2023 she was banned from the World Championships for refusing to shake the hand of Anna Smirnova, a Russian athlete who was competing beneath a impartial flag. Her disqualification was later canceled.
One other Ukrainian Olympic champion, boxer Wladimir Klitschko posted Heraskevych’s picture on Instagram, writing, “After I consider my Olympic medal at present, I do not really feel satisfaction anymore. I really feel disgrace. For the IOC, the present should go on. I am right here to say what they do not need to hear: the killing should cease.”
Ukraine’s Dmytro Shepiuk holds a sticker studying “UKR heroes with us” on the end space throughout a males’s super-G race, on the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Bormio, Italy, Wednesday.
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Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP
Different Ukrainian athletes at present competing on the Winter Video games additionally confirmed help. The nation’s luge staff knelt and raised their helmets after competing. And skier Dmytro Shepiuk held up a yellow observe on his glove saying “UKR heroes with us.”
Heraskevych can keep however cannot race
IOC President Kirsty Coventry mentioned the Ukrainian skeleton racer can proceed to be on the Milan Cortina Video games regardless of not with the ability to compete. Heraskevych filed an attraction to the Courtroom of Arbitration for Sport over his disqualification.
In the meantime Ukrainians on social media are calling on Ukraine’s sport officers to rent one of the best legal professionals to problem the Olympic committee’s choice.
For a lot of of Heraskevych’s supporters that is now a matter of justice — Ukrainians already name him a nationwide hero and say that for them, he has received, even with out competing in a race.
