"Ukrainians still have to survive to get to the Olympics": world champion outraged by Russians' admission to the 2024 Olympics

Olympic medalist, world and European champion in synchronized swimming Marta Fedina is outraged by the fact that the International Olympic Committee allowed Russians to participate in the 2024 Games in Paris in a neutral status. And the sports community claims equal conditions for everyone when Russia is destroying Ukrainian cities, and Marta and her team are sitting in a shelter instead of training.

In a conversation with OBOZ.UA, Fedina told us what she was thinking while hiding from the Russian missile attack on Kharkiv on January 2 and explained why there is no question of any level playing field now.

"We had our first training session of the new year on January 2, but we were let go early because of what happened. And that's understandable. And you know, at that moment I thought that they allow Russia to compete, though not in all kinds of events, but still, and they talk about some kind of equal conditions..." the synchronized swimmer was outraged.

"Even if we don't talk about life outside of sports, about how many people are left without their homes and just without everything, we simply don't have the same time to train," Marta emphasized.

"And it's not our fault, because we just prepare less than they do. We just don't have the opportunity to train. We don't have equal conditions for training now. Not to mention our morale and so on. And we started a new year, but our neighbors are still the same," the athlete said.

It just doesn't make sense in Marta's mind that after almost every day some Ukrainian city suffers from this horror due to Russian aggression, Russian athletes are still allowed to participate in the Olympics: "Okay, not all of them, but still - how can we even talk about it?"

"I believe that this should never be allowed to happen again in my life, and here they are talking about this year... They were talking about 2030, 2028... And here they allow it to happen in 2024. This is at a time when we, Ukrainians, still need to survive to get to this Olympics," Fedina said.

Earlier, OBOZ.UA reported that, according to the world champion, "Europe is exhausted from our war ." Fedina spoke about the attitude towards Ukraine, unclear rules and life under sirens.

Only verified information is available on OBOZ.UA Telegram channel and Viber. Do not fall for fakes!