Russia’s long sporting exile is ending.
A pariah in global sports for more than a decade, Russia will be represented by a small team of athletes at the 2026 Paralympic Games in Italy next month, organizers confirmed, prompting condemnation from European leaders on Wednesday.
The decision follows increased acceptance among sporting leaders that Russia’s yearslong Olympic suspension should end, and could pave the way for a Russian team to compete at the Summer Games in Los Angeles in 2028.
At the Paralympics, which will follow the conclusion of the Winter Olympics on Sunday, the Russian flag and anthem will be allowed to appear for the first time since 2014, when the revelation of an enormous state-sanctioned doping scheme at the Winter Games prompted international sports federations to impose bans on Russian athletes.
Those sanctions deepened as Russia attempted to cover up the scale of its cheating and then, in 2022, launched its invasion of neighboring Ukraine.
The International Paralympic Committee said on Tuesday that Russia and its ally Belarus, which provided support for the invasion of Ukraine, would be represented by athletes in skiing events. Six athletes from Russia and four from Belarus would be able to compete, it said, prompting harsh criticism from Ukraine and its European allies.
“While Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine continues, I cannot support the reinstatement of national symbols, flags, anthems and uniforms that are inseparable from that conflict,” Glenn Micallef, the European Commission’s representative for sports, said in a social media post, adding that he would not attend the Paralympics opening ceremony in protest.
Britain’s sports minister, Lisa Nandy, said that allowing the athletes to “compete under their own flags while the brutal invasion of Ukraine continues sends a terrible message.”
Ukraine’s sports minister, Matvii Bidnyi, called the decision “outrageous” and said Ukrainian officials would not travel to the Paralympics or participate in official events there.
The war in Ukraine has already been a flashpoint at the Winter Games in Italy, where Russia is not officially represented, though 13 Russian athletes were cleared to compete under “neutral” status.
Last week, a Ukrainian skeleton athlete was disqualified because he planned to race wearing a helmet honoring countrymen killed in the war. The International Olympic Committee said that violated its ban on political speech during competition.
The move to allow Russian athletes at the Paralympics came as something of a surprise. The International Paralympic Committee’s more than 200 members voted last year to lift a ban on Russian participation, but the committee’s president, Andrew Parsons, had suggested earlier this month that it was too late for Russian athletes to qualify for the competition. The hockey tournament, for example, had already selected the countries that would participate.
But decisions about which athletes can participate often come down to federations governing the individual sports, which gave Russian sports officials an opportunity.
In December, Russia successfully challenged a prohibition by the ski federation at the top court for sports disputes, in Switzerland, and requested the equivalent of wild-card spots for their athletes. Those places, typically reserved for elite athletes who missed out on qualification because of unforeseen circumstances, like injuries or pregnancies, are up to the discretion of federations and the Paralympic governing body. The ski federation then requested 10 such spots for Russian and Belarusian competitors.
The vote to restore Russia to the Paralympics came after some members of the I.P.C. argued that the conditions that led to the original ban had changed. The ban was the result of evidence that Russia was using its participation in international events to promote the war in Ukraine, including by Russian athletes displaying symbols of the invasion, such as the letter Z, on their uniforms and equipment.
Some sports federations, including those for curling and the biathlon, maintain bans on Russia. But attitudes appear to have softened among sports leaders. Kirsty Coventry, the I.O.C. president, said this month that sports must be a “neutral ground,” separate from politics. Earlier, the president of FIFA, the governing body for world soccer, said he would like to see Russia return to the sport’s international competitions.
The first sign of Russia’s return could come at the Paralympics opening ceremony in Verona, Italy, on March 6. Each participating nation is allowed to have two athletes and two officials take part in the parade of nations, a moment of high national symbolism on the global stage. Russia has yet to confirm if it will be there, an I.P.C. spokesman said on Wednesday.
Russia’s Olympic committee remains banned from the Olympic Games over its move in 2023 to absorb the sports institutions in several occupied Ukrainian regions. Russian officials say that they have since reorganized how they govern sports and are now in compliance with Olympic rules.
Russia’s sports minister, Mikhail V. Degtyarev, said that he expected the I.O.C.’s executive board to decide in April or May whether to lift its ban.
“If the I.O.C. doesn’t bring our case up for discussion, we’ll of course go to court,” Mr. Degtyarev was quoted as saying by Championat, a Russian sports website.
Tariq Panja is a global sports correspondent, focusing on stories where money, geopolitics and crime intersect with the sports world.
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