To do with the IOC: what goals does the Russian Olympic Committee set for the new year

The Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) has approved a new charter. In addition to renaming the position of the head from president to chairman, the new version of the organization's main document provides for an expansion of the number of executive committee members from 29 to 31, and also eliminates the provision that allows challenging ROC decisions at the National Center for Sports Arbitration. All these changes were approved by the Olympic meeting held on December 10, at which Mikhail Degtyarev, Minister of Sports of the Russian Federation and head of the ROC, also reported on the work for the year, especially paying attention to the successes in returning Russian athletes to international competitions.

Regulation

124 delegates of the Olympic Assembly voted in favor of changing the charter and making additions to it, three abstained. In March 2025, Mikhail Degtyarev announced that the ROC had amended the charter in accordance with the Olympic Charter. He noted that the new version of the charter has already been delivered to the International Olympic Committee (IOC). It remains the main requirement on the way to restoring the ROC's membership in the IOC. Now it has been approved at the Olympic assembly.

The most symbolic was the renaming of the position of President of the ROC to chairman. Also, all the vice-presidents of the organization will now be called vice-chairmen. Mikhail Degtyarev replied that "we have only one president now."

A new category of members will appear in the ROC structure — all-Russian public associations of a sports orientation. The ROC Executive Committee has been expanded from 29 to 31 members. This was explained by the need to increase the representation of all-Russian federations in sports included in the Olympic Games program.

In addition, a provision has been removed from the ROC charter that allows challenging ROC decisions at the National Center for Sports Arbitration. This is due to the fact that such a claim may cause a conflict of interest, since the ROC is the sole founder of the Sports Arbitration Chamber. In addition, the charter includes new areas of the ROC's activities, including: the development of culture and art in the field of sports and Olympism, cooperation with the Russian Sports Foundation and the expansion of marketing opportunities.

International activities

Reporting to the delegates of the Olympic Assembly, Mikhail Degtyarev elaborated on the work on the disbandment of our athletes, recalling the main achievements that have happened over the past year. In a neutral status, Russians began to be allowed to compete back in 2023, and in August 2024, some of them competed at the Olympics in Paris. But under Degtyarev, who became the head of the Ministry of Sports in May 2024 and the ROC seven months later, the admission process accelerated, and there was a breakthrough in some issues.

So, back in December 2024, admissions of athletes in team disciplines began, for example, in relay races for swimmers and team competitions for gymnasts. In November 2025, the first admission occurred in team sports — we are talking about water polo. And recently, judoists and sambo wrestlers were already allowed under Russian symbols.

—In total, 67 international federations, including 34 Olympic federations, have already allowed athletes from Russia to participate in international competitions. 4,200 Russian athletes have received international status, 700 of them this year," Degtyarev reported. — A monitoring group has been formed in the ROC, which records the status of athletes' admission to all Olympic sports. This kind of work had never been done in the ROC before — we did not know how many of our athletes were in what status. Where there are trials, where there are refusals, and where there are positive decisions. Russians are allowed to participate in team tournaments in swimming, fencing, judo, archery, rowing, and modern pentathlon. This allowed us to compete in most of the largest international tournaments, in 40 world and European championships in Olympic sports, as a result of which we won 112 medals. Our guys showed excellent results in martial arts, weightlifting, rhythmic and athletic gymnastics, rowing, figure skating, water sports, cycling, in some cases taking the entire podium.

In addition, the Minister of Sports and the head of the ROC noted the restoration of the status of the Russian Paralympic Committee (RPC) and the first performance of Russians at the Universiade since 2019. Russia has begun to restore its representation in international organizations.

The ROC maintains contact with the International Olympic Committee, international Olympic sports federations, and many other organizations. The decision of the Executive Committee of the European Gymnastics Union to elect Marat Filippov, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Olympic Committee and Secretary of the Presidential Council for the Development of Culture and Sports, stands out in particular. In addition, our country has been elected to the UNESCO Anti-Doping Foundation committee for the first time since 2019.

Separately, the Minister of Sports highlighted the successes in the legal field, talking about the four cases recently won at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne (CAS), which resulted in the reinstatement of skiers, luge skiers, bobsledders, skeleton racers and table tennis players. Some of them have already received neutral status and are allowed to participate in international competitions.

The main task for 2026 was announced as the final restoration of the ROC status in the IOC system.

"The legal work with the IOC continues," Degtyarev said. — We are awaiting the decision of the Executive Committee of the International Olympic Committee on the restoration of the rights of the ROC. The IOC Legal Commission has almost completed its work. Our delegation is scheduled to travel to Switzerland in January. Therefore, in general, the work was recognized as satisfactory in the outgoing year, although there were proposals to recognize it as successful, but I believe that we will be able to recognize it as successful only after the full restoration of the ROC and all our national teams will have access to international competitions.

The next Winter Olympics will be held in February in the Italian cities of Cortina D'Ampezzo and Milan. The final list of Russians who will be allowed there in a neutral status is still unknown. Figure skaters Adelia Petrosyan and Peter Humennik were the first to receive such admission.