Published on : 04/08/2021 – 12:19
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya is expected in Warsaw in the evening on Wednesday. Poland granted her a humanitarian visa after the sprinter claimed on Sunday that she escaped forced repatriation to Belarus days after openly criticizing her country’s Athletics Federation at the Tokyo Olympics.
With our correspondent in Tokyo, Frédéric Charles
Belarusian sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya flew in Japan, but not directly to Warsaw. The athlete left for Vienna, she took her place at the last moment on board a plane of the Austrian company Austrian Airlines. ” According to the information we have, it is expected that she will return to Warsaw this evening. A spokesman for the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Wednesday before the stopover.
This last hour change is believed to be due to security reasons. We remember that the Belarusian authorities did not hesitate to hijack an airliner aboard which was an opposition journalist in exile.
►Also read: Tokyo 2021: Belarusian Krystsina Tsimanouskaya claims to have been forced to leave Japan
The sprinter arrived at Narita airport in Tokyo under good police escort, she appeared masked. She was wearing sunglasses that read “I run clean” in reference to an anti-doping education program from the European Athletics Association. She made no statement to the press before her departure, which took place shortly after 11 a.m. (2 a.m. UT).
The young woman had remained confined since Monday at the Polish embassy in Tokyo, without speaking to the media. She had left the embassy early Wednesday in a car with tinted windows, so it was not possible to identify her for sure. For security reasons, the Polish authorities did not wish to give any information in advance about his departure from Tokyo.
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya had criticized her federation in Tokyo for wanting to force her to participate in a 4×400-meter relay at the Olympic Games, because two other Belarusian athletes had not carried out a sufficient number of anti-doping controls.
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