The information is revealed by the agency Reuters : two cross-country skiers from the Belarusian national team were deprived of competition by their national federation. They are accused of supporting opposition to the regime of President Aleksander Lukashenko. Sviatlana Andriyuk (22 years old) and Darya Dolidovich (17 years old) chose to break the law of silence. They explain that their FIS (International Ski Federation) numbers, which are essential for competing in an international competition, have been deactivated by their federation. They are therefore unable to start a race, and by extension hope to be selected for the Beijing Games. The older of the two Belarusians, Sviatlana Andriyuk, told Reuters that the order to erase them from the landscape was given last November by the president of the Belarusian Cross-Country Skiing Federation, Aliaksandr Darakhovich. “ They accused me of being a supporter of the opposition. says she. Darya Dolidovich believes, for his part, that his sidelining would be the consequence of the support shown by his father Sergei, a former Belarusian Olympic skier, for the political opposition. Their case is reminiscent of another, the attempted forced repatriation of Belarusian sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya at the Tokyo 2020 Games. A refugee in Poland, she now hopes to change her sporting nationality and pursue her career under the colors of her host country .
