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Hints of Russians’ Return to International Sports Rekindle Debate Over Their Exclusion

Thomas Bach, the leader of the International Olympic Committee, has said that sport needs to find a means for building peace and communication. His member organizations are saying, “Not yet.”

Russia’s team competing at the Beijing Games in February as the Russian Olympic Committee.Credit...Jae C. Hong/Associated Press

They are the questions in international sports that will not go away: Should Russian and Belarusian athletes be allowed to compete and, if not, then how long should they remain in sporting Siberia?

Those questions have taken on new urgency this month, as competitions in winter sports get underway for the first time since earlier this year, when those two nations were thrown out in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.