UK government to boycott Winter Paralympics opening ceremony after 'barbaric' statement
Team GB and six other nations will not be taking part in the Winter Paralympics opening ceremony tonight, as the UK government confirmed that no government ministers or officials will attend the opening or closing ceremonies.
They are also boycotting the opening event, which is set to take place at the Arena di Verona in Verona tonight (6 March).
Paralympics GB will not be present, citing scheduling and performance reasons, with the Games set to get underway in Cortina at 9am on Saturday morning - three hours away from Verona.
Numerous governments, including the UK, have expressed their disappointment at the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) for allowing Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete under their own flags.
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In the Winter Olympic Games, they competed as Individual Neutral Athletes (AIN).
A statement from a UK government spokesperson said: “We strongly oppose the decision of the International Paralympic Committee to allow Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete under their own flags at the Milan-Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games.
"We have been clear that Russian and Belarusian states should not be represented in international sport while the barbaric full-scale invasion of Ukraine is ongoing. Therefore, no Government Ministers or officials will attend the Opening or Closing Ceremonies of the Paralympics.”
They added that the Minister for Sport, Stephanie Peacock, will be in Cortina 'purely to support our inspirational ParalympicsGB athletes, as she was there to support TeamGB at the Winter Olympics last month'.
Last September, a General Assembly of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) held a vote by 177 of 211 IPC members, deciding whether athletes from Russia and Belarus could compete under their national flag, logos and emblems.
It went in favour of the nations, who were banned due to Russia's war in Ukraine since 2023, though they hadn't competed as nations at a Paralympics since the Sochi 2014 Games after a state-sponsored doping programme led to sanctions being imposed.
Reports state that the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Netherlands, and Ukraine will not be involved in the opening ceremony either.
According to The Independent, Ukraine was the first to announce a boycott of the opening ceremony for political reasons.
The Guardian reports that the IPC's estimated turnout of competing countries is less than 60 per cent.
Andrew Parsons, the president of the IPC, defended the decision, saying while he acknowledged that it 'has not been well received in some parts of the world', the IPC 'is a democratic global organisation whose decisions on member suspension are determined by its members'.
Paralympic GB's flagbearers, skiing duo Menna Fitzpatrick and Scott Meenagh, will not be at the ceremony as they are competing tomorrow.
They will instead take part in a video sequence with other teammates, which will be shown as part of the parade.
Speaking to BBC Sport, Paralympics GB chef de mission Phil Smith explained: "We made that decision [not to attend] about a year ago when we knew that the opening ceremony was going to be as far away from where we are up here in the mountains as we are,
"I think there are a number of nations who are in the same boat. We know that any athletes who do attend from here in Cortina won't be getting back to the athlete village until between two or three in the morning.
"All of our athletes here compete on the first day so from a pure performance and sport perspective, it was never our intention to send athletes to the opening ceremony."
Joshua Nair