(Motorsport-Total.com) – Ukraine has further intensified its complaint against the FIA’s decision to lift the ban on Russian athletes at international events and has contacted the world federation’s appeals court – just days after requesting an urgent investigation from the FIA Ethics Council.
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The Ukrainian Automobile Federation FAU emphasizes that lifting the ban on Russia would simultaneously effectively impose restrictions on Ukraine and some partner countries.
“This concerns those countries that have banned participation in competitions where the national symbols of the aggressor state are displayed,” says a statement from federation president Oleksandr Feldman.
The statement further says that since Russia’s invasion of the country, 23 Ukrainian motorsport athletes and officials have been killed and that the war “has paralyzed motorsport and severely restricted freedom of movement throughout the country.”
The FAU’s criticism is fundamentally based on the fact that the Russian Automobile Federation (RAF), according to the Ukrainians, has opened and operates offices in Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine – specifically in Crimea, the city of Sevastopol, as well as in the Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.
These are recognized by the United Nations as sovereign Ukrainian territory. However, according to FIA statutes, only one automobile federation per country is allowed, so this would not be permissible.
“This is a blatant violation of the Russian Automobile Federation against the FIA statutes and the International Sporting Code, to which it is bound like every FIA member organization,” emphasizes Feldman.
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Further: “You cannot become the authoritative national sports authority through drones and rockets. We urge the FIA to take immediate action to put an end to these violations and sanction the Russian Automobile Federation for its actions.”
The federation also emphasizes that the head of the RAF, Boris Rotenberg, “is directly subject to international sanctions imposed by the USA, Great Britain, the EU, and other allied jurisdictions in response to the aggression against Ukraine.”
Feldman stresses: “We will exhaust all legal means available to us to restore the integrity of the motorsport system in accordance with the FIA statutes.”
At the beginning of August, the FIA lifted the ban imposed in 2022 on Russian and Belarusian athletes. They are now allowed to participate unrestricted under their own flag in competitions and display national symbols. Playing the anthem has also been permitted again.
Only competitions on Russian and Belarusian soil remain currently banned.
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