The nearly-year-old invasion has utterly shredded what was left of friendships and in a divisive and growing split within the Olympic movement over whether Russia and ally Belarus should be barred from next year's Paris Games.
They fought on the same side and together won Olympic gold, young men from Russia and a newly independent Ukraine, joined for one last medal-winning hurrah on a short-lived post-Soviet Unified Team at the 1992 Barcelona Games.
"I don't want to talk to him. I don't want to know him at all. He is my enemy, who supports this war, who considers it an honour for athletes to take part in the war against Ukrainians, to kill Ukrainians," Guttsait said. "Therefore, for today and forever, this person does not exist for me." In an interview late Tuesday with The Associated Press, Guttsait laid out the process that could lead to a Ukrainian boycott of Paris if that happens. The minister said his own personal opinion is that "we need to boycott" if Russians and Belarusians attend. But he added that the decision isn't his alone to make and said the Ukrainian Olympic Committee will convene an extraordinary meeting and "we will decide together whether we will participate or not.
International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach is facing a widespread backlash from Ukraine and its allies for opening a door for some athletes from Russia and Belarus to return to international competition. Bach argues that the Olympic movement has a "unifying mission of bringing people together" and a proven track record of opening lines of communication between nations divided by conflict.
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