Back to the Future: Sochi, Kazan and New York City

Around the anniversary of the Russian war of destruction in Ukraine and just a few days after the death of Alexei Navalny, President Vladimir Putin continues to routinely use sport for propaganda. In Tatarstan's capital Kazan, he opened the first so-called Games of the Future, the prelude to a whole series of major international competitions in this Olympic year in Russia. 

Also present in Kazan:

• the internationally multi-sanctioned Dmitry Chernyshenko, Deputy Prime Minister of Russia and CEO of the Sochi Doping Games 2014; 
• former IOC member René Fasel, Life President of the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF), who does business in Russia and allegedly has Russian citizenship in addition to his Swiss citizenship;
• at least one active NOC president, Emomali Rahmon, President of Tajikistan, who has once again violated the recommendations of the IOC;
• at least one former NOC president, Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko, whose son Viktor now heads the Belarusian NOC;
• numerous top Russian athletes – including the Olympic champion Nikita Nagornyy and, of course, the doped and suspended ice princess Kamila Valieva.

The tentacles of the Russian state invade Kamila Valieva

Is it still state doping in Russia under the supervision of the FMBA? Russian athletes are spoilt for choice between the carrot and the stick. Either they toe the FMBA line and compete, or face the wrath of the Russian state and expulsion from the sport.

THE INQUISITORAndy Brown

Whether Russia's NOC president Stanislav Pozdnyakov was in Kazan with Putin could not yet be reliably ascertained. If readers have any information on this, we will update the article.

As always, sport (or what Putin considers to be sport and what the Olympic family, which cooperated with Putin for an eternity, considered to be sport) cannot be separated from his murderous politics. Just before the opening show of the so-called Games of the Future, Putin paid a demonstrative visit to the Gorbunov Kazan Aviation Plant. The company, a Tupolev subsidiary, ranks among major Russian aviation industry enterprises. The Kazan Aviation Plant is preparing to produce new Tu-160M strategic bomber/missile carriers.

This is how the Kremlin propagandists sold the visit:

„The President looked at information stands on the Kazan Aviation Plant’s achievements and inspected three overhauled Tu-160M strategic missile carriers. Vladimir Putin climbed into the cockpit of one of them and sat at the control wheel." 

Then the Games of the Future in Kazan, where some of the world championships and mega events that were part of the shameful decade of Russian sport took place, such as the 2013 Summer Universiade, the 2015 Swimming World Championships and matches at the 2018 Football World Cup. Now Putin declared:

"I am glad to welcome to Russia the pioneers of phygital sports which is an innovative format that gave rise to the name to the competition. These are indeed the Games of the Future. It makes perfect sense that the idea to merge conventional and e-sports was born in Russia. Our country remains one of the leading sports powerhouses on the planet, the home of great athletes, victories and records. We have always championed sport and its lofty humanistic values. The Games of the Future are our gift to the international sports family." 

Putin claimed that athletes from more than 100 nations take part in these games.

"This is the unique value of the Games of the Future for us along with the core principles of sport such as solidarity of countries and peoples, equality of all athletes, fair play and giving your all. The international phygital tournament is a unique event in the modern history of international sports – which begins right here and now in Russia."

The sermon on fair play in the state doping wonderland, which apparently still practises state doping, could not be without the equally mendacious reference to the alleged separation of sport and politics:

"The Games of the Future is free from politics, as well as all discrimination and double standards. I am positive that the true spirit of sports will be on display at the Games venues." 

The term double standards is also part of the ABC of Russian propaganda. The claim of double standards, for example, also characterises the campaign for a total boycott of Israeli sport, which is heavily supported by Russia:

Calls for Israel to be banned from the Olympics: influenced by ideological-religious whataboutism

For several weeks now, an online petition has been calling for “Suspend Israel from International Sports”. The appeal was launched by the left-wing collective movement DiEM25. In the petition paper, fundamental facts are being omitted or deliberately distorted.

THE INQUISITORJens Weinreich

One day later, on Thursday, Putin flew a 30 minutes training flight with the nuclear bomber – his latest threatening message to the West.

And now to the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, to New York City.

First conviction on the basis of the Rodchenkov Anti-Doping Act

There, ten years after the Sochi state doping games, where thousands of athletes from all over the world were cheated by Russia and the Olympic system, the first conviction was made on the basis of the Rodchenkov Anti-Doping Act. In other words, on the basis of a law that bears the name of the man who was primarily responsible for the gigantic doping fraud at the Sochi Games and beyond: Grigory Mikhailovich Rodchenkov, former head of the Russian so-called anti-doping laboratory, who went from perpetrator to crown witness.

Yesterday, Wednesday, when Putin was in Kazan on a propaganda tour, public prosecutor Damian Williams announced the first judgement based on the Rodchenkov Act:

Eric Lira was sentenced to three months in prison by Judge Lorna G. Schofield (Southern District of New York) for his role in providing banned performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) to Olympic athletes in advance of the 2020 Summer Olympic Games held in Tokyo in 2021.