Olympia: Despite IOC exclusion: Russia renounces Olympic boycott

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has announced a boycott of the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang (09. till 25. February) by his country.

“We will certainly not announce a boycott,”Putin said on Wednesday afternoon.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) ruled Russia’s athletes out of the South Korean Games on Tuesday evening because of systematic doping, but offered clean athletes the prospect of a neutral start under certain conditions.

“We will not prevent our Olympic athletes from taking part in the competition,”Putin said during a speech at an automobile plant in Nizhny Novgorod.