Ukraine's fencing team leader, Olga Kharlan, was withdrawn from participating in the World Championship after she declined to shake hands with the neutral athlete from Russia, Anna Smirnova, following her victory.
Kharlan took part in the individual saber fencing tournament at the World Championship the day after the Ministry of Youth and Sports of Ukraine changed the text of the order regarding the boycott of competitions involving Russian and Belarusian athletes. She faced and defeated the neutral Russian fencer in the first match of the play-off stage.
After the match, Kharlan refused to shake hands with Smirnova and offered to “salute” with their weapons instead. With no response from the Russian fencer, the Ukrainian athlete left the strip.
Smirnova attempted to protest Kharlan’s actions, referring to the refusal of the “salute” as per the rules of the International Fencing Federation, which results in a black card penalty, leading to disqualification from the tournament. Despite this, Kharlan advanced to the next round in the live scoreboard and was supposed to face Bulgarian fencer Yoana Ilieva.
However, the match between Kharlan and Ilieva did not take place, as both fencers did not come out to the strip. The live scoreboard showed that the Bulgarian athlete advanced to the next round.
In the official protocol, next to Olga Kharlan’s name, it is marked as “excluded”.
According to the FIE (International Fencing Federation) rules, “exclusion” has only one interpretation, which entails disqualification from the competition and suspension for 60 days from all future events. Therefore, the Ukrainian fencer will have to miss the team fencing tournament where neutral representatives from Russia and Belarus are not present.
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