Ukrainian gymnast wins silver at world championships. Olympic spot is up in the air

ANTWERP, Belgium — Ukrainian gymnast Illia Kovtun has no say on whether Russian athletes will be allowed to be at next year’s Paris Olympics. Or, if they are, whether his country will let him and his fellow athletes compete.

All he can do is his job. And hope it will help convince Ukrainian officials that he and the rest of the Ukrainian team should go to the Paris Games no matter what. That their presence alone will be an act of defiance.

Kovtun won the silver in the men’s all-around at the world gymnastics championships Thursday night. It’s his second time on the podium in three years, but first since Russia invaded Ukraine without provocation and forced Kovtun to flee his homeland.

“It’s a hard time, so it’s a very special medal,” Kovtun said through a translator.

The International Olympic Committee has not said yet whether athletes from Russia or Belarus will be allowed in Paris or even when it will make a decision. But despite vehement objections from Ukraine, the IOC has said the individual sports federations should find “a pathway” for “individual neutral athletes” to return to competition. The International Gymnastics Federation has said it will do so beginning Jan. 1.

The issue has particular meaning to Kovtun. The week after Russia invaded Ukraine, Kovtun had to share a podium with a Russian athlete who wrote the pro-war “Z” symbol on his uniform. Ivan Kuliak was supposedly competing at the World Cup as a “neutral” athlete because Russia had been banned.

Kuliak was suspended for a year for the demonstration.

“It was a hard day because we didn’t know what to do. We didn’t know what will be with our country,” Kovtun said.

Though Kovtun said his family is safe, he has had to spend the last year in Croatia so he can continue training. Gymnastics is his love and his job. But it’s also the way he and his fellow athletes can show support for their country — and show Russia that no amount of bombs will destroy Ukraine’s spirit.

“My country has done all (it can) not to let Russian athletes go to Paris because they’re supporting the war. But unfortunately, we can’t do anything,” Kovtun said. “But we will do our best. We will work and we will place.”