PUTIN SCRAPS ‘FRIENDSHIP GAMES’ AMID GLOBAL BACKLASH

Russian President Vladimir Putin has officially shelved the planned «Friendship Games,» a revival of the Soviet-era multi-sport event designed to rival the Olympics. 

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) had condemned the initiative as a blatant political propaganda tool.  

Originally conceived as a response to the U.S.-led boycott of the 1980 Moscow Games, the Friendship Games were first staged in 1984 to counter the Los Angeles Olympics, which the Soviet Union boycotted. Announced last year, the revival of this competition was framed as a celebration of international unity but was widely viewed as an attempt to assert Russia’s global influence amid its growing isolation.  

In March, the IOC criticized the plan for violating the Olympic Charter and discouraged participation. Putin’s decree, published Monday, formally canceled the event but left the door open for its potential revival pending a «special decision of the president.»  

Russia’s use of sports as a propaganda tool has become increasingly transparent. Once a dominant force in the Olympics, Russia has been barred from competing as a team due to its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At this year’s Paris Olympics, only a few Russian athletes were allowed to participate as «individual neutral athletes,» a designation widely criticized as farcical given the impossibility of separating sports from state politics in Russia.  

This cancellation underscores Russia’s waning influence in international sports, where its actions are met with condemnation rather than competition.