The Sports and Youth Commission of the Syrian Interim Government (SIG) denounced acceptance by any Arab or international federation to participate in the tournaments and events held by the Assad regime in Syria or inviting the regime to participate in sports activities abroad. It stressed that these activities serve to support the regime that has committed crimes against the Syrian people, and represent an attempt to normalize relations with it.
In a press release issued on Thursday, the Commission said that just as the Assad regime occupies Syria’s seat in the United Nations and exploits its presence there legally and politically, it also occupies Syria’s seat in the International Olympic Committee. It added that Syria’s seat in the International Olympic Committee must not be one of the rights of the criminals or as an expression of them, rather it belongs to the free Syrians only, those who are making enormous sacrifices to preserve their dignity, build their homeland, and hold their oppressors accountable.
The Commission condemned the criminal regime’s organization, through its sports federations, of tournaments in the capital, Damascus, and its participation in Arab tournaments at the invitations of various Arab sports federations in recent weeks.
The Commission called on Arab sports federations to refuse to participate in the regime’s sports activities, not to invite the regime to Arab tournaments, not to rehabilitate the regime at the sports level, and to commit to the lofty Olympic sports principles.
The Commission called on the International Olympic Committee to treat the Assad regime as it treated Russia after its war on Ukraine, to ban the regime from all foreign sports activities, and not to recognize it as part of the international Olympic system.
(Source: SOC’s Media Department)
