The case of the Belarusian Kristina Timanovskaya recently attracted attention when she prevented her involuntary return flight.
Now she has found a new home.
Tokyo - On Monday morning, sprinter Kristina Timanowskaja should have started the 200-meter run in the Olympics *, but the athlete from Belarus instead had to struggle with existential problems.
After publicly criticizing her association, the 24-year-old was supposed to be sent home "forcibly" but turned to local police at the airport and was taken to safety.
After her public request for political asylum, there was now positive news.
Olympia: Japanese police prevent Timanowskaja's involuntary return flight - sprinter with a public call for help
Returning to Belarus is out of the question for Timanovskaya in view of the reactions to her criticism.
She is convinced that she is “no longer safe” and “will end up in jail” in her home country, the athlete told the
tribuna.com
portal
.
As she learned from her trainer, her fate was not decided in the athletics federation or the Ministry of Sports, but "at a much higher level".
The explanation that the Belarusian delegation management had prepared in view of the athlete's return trip was quickly exposed as a “lie” by the sprinter.
Timanovskaya is said to have had "mental problems".
"We had signals that something was wrong with the girl," claimed her trainer Yuri Moisewitsch on the state television station STV.
Fearing the consequences of an involuntary return to Minsk, Timanovskaya launched a public appeal for help on social media.
The Japanese police prevented their involuntary flight back to Minsk via Istanbul, whereupon they were brought to safety at an airport hotel in Tokyo with the help of the International Olympic Committee.
Olympia: Poland grants sprinter Timanowskaja from Belarus asylum - her husband has already fled
Some countries immediately turned to Timanowskaya, for example the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Poland granted them asylum. During the course of the day, she decided on Poland. Poland's Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz confirmed that a visa would already be available for them. Her husband Arseni Zdanewitsch had already fled from Belarus to Kiev, as he reported to the AFP news agency. He hopes to be able to follow his wife to her new home “in the near future”.
The human rights organization Human Rights Watch also got involved and called on the IOC to act. Tanja Lokschina, director of the organization's Russia program, described the case to SID as "very disturbing". Timanovskaya was supposed to be "deported in an outrageous way", which is why the IOC is now called upon to "publicly condemn what happened", but the committee had "acted promptly and consistently". The IOC then referred to the past sanctions against the Belarusian Olympic Committee.
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