Putin is smiling tonight: His friend IOC President Bach fixed Russian participation in the Rio Olympics

Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is smiling tonight. His friend, the German President of the IOC Thomas Bach, did what he was asked to do:

The Russian flag will be flying at the Summer Olympics, after all, as the International Olympic Committee decided Sunday that athletes from the nation mired in an ongoing drug scandal will be allowed to compete on the sporting world’s largest stage next month in Rio de Janeiro.
Less than two weeks before the start of the Rio Games, the International Olympic Committee ruled against barring Russia from the Summer Olympics but did approve measures that could reduce the number of Russian athletes participating.

Here is how sports, business and "friendship" mix in Bach´s world:

Bach has been a regular visitor to Russia in his three years as head of the IOC, both before and after the Sochi Olympics. Putin has also shown himself willing to travel to improve contacts with the IOC, giving a well received speech in 2007 in Guatemala — delivered in English, which is rare for Putin — ahead of the vote which gave Sochi the 2014 Olympics.
Since he won Olympic gold in 1976, Bach’s chosen sport of fencing has been transformed, most recently by Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov, a Putin ally who has pumped large sums of his own money into the sport over eight years as president of the International Fencing Federation.
That money has increased the profile of one of the more niche sports on the Olympic program, making for a bigger media presence and glitzier competitions.
Bach also has business connections in Russia. After becoming president of the IOC, he kept his other role as chairman of the supervisory board of Weinig, a Germany company which produces woodworking machinery. Weinig, which did not respond to requests for comment, has a strong presence in Russia, with a headquarters near Moscow and offices across the country.
Besides Bach, several other influential IOC members have long been sympathetic to Russia.

Garri Kasparov about Putin's winter games and the new IOC President

Putin's Sochi games are over, but we should not forget what Garri Kasparov recently wrote about them and about the new IOC President:

New IOC President Thomas Bach’s strained protests about how foreign leaders protesting Sochi are “inserting politics into sport” ignore that fact that selling a huge platform for propaganda and corruption to a dictatorship is also “playing politics.” By Bach’s dubious rationale, the IOC would award the Games to North Korea as long as the venues were adequate and the fees were paid promptly. --

 .... Russians will be left with the environmental disaster, the corruption and the repression, the debts, and the same crooks and thugs who created them all. The future is not bright for Sochi, unless you believe that misery loves company. The 2018 World Cup will be held in Russia and reports are already circulating about how behind schedule the venues are. It will be Sochi times ten.

The cosy relationship between the IOC and Putin's mafia state



Killy on Putin:

"When he plays sad tunes on the piano at the end of an evening with 10 ministers singing along, that's not hum-drum."


"Putin has staked his reputation on the smooth hosting of the winter games. Based on the planning, it either speaks to how little he values his reputation, or more likely, that beneath the steely glare and martial arts muscles, he’s being exposed as little more than a thuggish front man for a kleptocracy.
According to a detailed report issued by Russian opposition leaders in May, businessmen and various consiglieres of Putin have stolen up to $30 billion from funds intended for Olympic preparations. This has pushed the cost of the winter games, historically far less expensive than their summer counterpart to over $50 billion, more than four times the original estimate. That $50 billion price tag would make them the most expensive games in history, more costly than the previous twenty-one winter games combined. It’s a price tag higher than even than the 2008 pre–global recession summer spectacle in Beijing."

Dave Zirin in The Nation


An interview in the French weekly Journal du Dimance the head of the Coordination Commission for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, former alpine skiing star Jean-Claude Killy says something about the cosy relationship between the IOC and Vladimir Putin's mafia state:

Former alpine skiing star Jean-Claude Killy said Sunday he enjoys "a very interesting relationship" with Vladimir Putin, saying the Russian president does not deserve the criticism levelled at him.
"I've developed a very interesting relationship with him," the triple Olympic champion said in an interview with French weekly Journal du Dimanche.
"I've worked with him for seven years, which has given me an opinion that is a little different from the one that is widely circulated," said Killy, head of the Coordination Commission for the 2014 Winter Olympics to be held in the Black Sea resort of Sochi.
Killy, 70, said "everything is going marvellously well" in his dealings with the Russian strongman. "You can get ahold of him in a minute just by calling his chief of staff."
"The Putin I know is not the one described in the newspapers, where you see real 'Putin-bashing'," he told the paper.
"I have no reason to follow the crowd; I trust what I see. When he calls me from Moscow at three in the morning his time to wish me a happy birthday, I find that nice."
He added: "When he plays sad tunes on the piano at the end of an evening with 10 ministers singing along, that's not hum-drum."
The run-up to the Winter Games to be held in Sochi from February 7 to 23 has been marred by controversy, notably over a law against "gay propaganda" that Putin signed in June.

Killy's praise for the dictator does not come as a surprise. Already in September this extraordinarily naïve and subservient man gave his stamp of approval to Russia's controversial law banning gay propaganda and the preparations for the games:

THE International Olympic Committee has dismissed concerns over Russia's law banning gay propaganda, saying it doesn't violate the Olympic charter.

Jean-Claude Killy, chairman of the IOC Coordination Commission, gave his stamp of approval during a news conference on Thursday at the conclusion of the commission's 10th and final visit to Sochi before the 2014 Winter Games, which begin on February 7

The Human Rights Campaign, the largest gay rights organisation in the US, condemned the IOC's assessment of the Russian law.

"If this law doesn't violate the IOC's charter, then the charter is completely meaningless," HRC president Chad Griffin said in a statement. "The safety of millions of LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) Russians and international travellers is at risk, and by all accounts the IOC has completed neglected its responsibility to Olympic athletes, sponsors and fans from around the world."

He noted that Mr Killy spoke a day after gay rights activists were arrested outside the Moscow headquarters of the Sochi Olympics organising committee for protesting the law.

Mr Killy said the IOC commission was pleased with the ongoing construction ahead of the games, which with a total cost of $51 billion will be the most expensive Olympics in history.

Killy began kowtowing to Putin already in 2008. Here is a transcript from Putin's (then Prime Minister) webpage:

Jean-Claude Killy (in translation): Thank you very much for the invitation and the meeting.

It is indeed a great honour and a great pleasure for me to work on this exciting project on behalf of the International Olympic Committee.
You told your counterparts that it was perhaps the chance of a lifetime to do a job like that. But for us, the International Olympic Committee, it is also a unique opportunity.
Vladimir Putin: I know you have made some remarks about document and information scheduling. We discussed them yesterday.
My colleagues must have informed you that we have prepared a special computer programme to follow progress on each facility. The programme will also give an overall view of the whole project, enabling us, the International Olympic Committee, and you as its representative to monitor the general picture and particular activities daily and even hourly.
Jean-Claude Killy: I am glad, because I think it is the utmost in organisation.
Vladimir Putin: It will be a success, I am sure.
Jean-Claude Killy: We are also absolutely sure.

PS

No wonder Killy and the IOC do not see anything wrong with the planning of the Sochi Olympics. They quite obviously rely on the "hourly" information from Putin's "special computer programme" - "the utmost in organisation".

(image by Wikipedia)

Winter Olympic Games in Sochi : A new level of corruption and exploitation

Vladimir Putin, dictator of Russia, has visited Sochi, the site of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games:

Russian President Vladimir Putin has invited visitors to the 2014 Winter Olympic Games, due to be held in the southern Russian resort of Sochi on the Black Sea next February.

“We invite to Russia all those who love sports and fair uncompromising struggle,” Putin said at a ceremony to mark one year before the start of the 2014 Winter Olympics on Thursday.

“In 2007, the International Olympic Committee [IOC] supported the Olympic dream of millions of Russian nationals,” Putin said. “We are doing everything possible to justify the confidence.”

The Russian president said he hoped the Sochi Games would take world sports to a qualitatively new level.--

Earlier Thursday, Putin called on Sochi 2014 Olympic organizers to redouble their efforts in one final push to stage the Games without a hitch.

Putin may be right about the Sochi games taking "world sports to a qualitatively new level" - a new level of corruption and exploitation. 

Human Rights Watch has just issued a damning report about the slave culture that has been established in Sochi:

 “Race to the Bottom: Exploitation of Migrant Workers Ahead of Russia’s 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi,” documents exploitation of migrant workers on key Olympic sites, including the Central Olympic Stadium, the Main Olympic Village, and the Main Media Center. Workers told Human Rights Watch that some employers cheated workers out of wages, required them to work 12-hour shifts with few days off, and confiscated passports and work permits, apparently to coerce workers to remain in exploitative jobs.

“Like the athletes competing in the 2014 Winter Olympics, Russia has big hopes and dreams for its performance in Sochi as the host,” said Jane Buchanan, associate Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch and author of the report. “But exploiting workers is a victory for no one, and Russia urgently needs to change course.” --

Workers consistently reported that employers failed to pay full wages and in some cases failed to pay workers at all. A group of workers employed on the Main Media Center, the central hub for journalists covering the Olympics, worked for months without wages, hoping to be paid. One worker from Uzbekistan, “Omurbek,” said that in December 2011 a subcontractor on the site offered him a job paying $770 per month.

“I worked for almost three months … for nothing. Nothing but promises, promises from them,” Omurbek told Human Rights Watch.

In a letter to Human Rights Watch, a subcontractor for the Main Media Center project who the workers said hired them, claimed that its workers are paid on time and in full.

Numerous workers on the Central Olympic Stadium site and on the Main Olympic Village site interviewed by Human Rights Watch said that employers withheld the first month’s wages. Workers received their first payment only after working for two months, and were told they would get the first month’s wages only after the employer decided they had completed the job. If they quit or were fired, they would not recover the first month’s wages.

“Athletes, journalists, and Olympic ticket holders in Sochi will watch the 2014 Winter Games in iconic modern sports venues, broadcast centers, and hotels,” Buchanan said. “But many migrant workers have toiled in exploitative, abusive conditions to build these shimmering façades and luxurious interiors.”

Although most migrant workers interviewed by Human Rights Watch signed employment contracts, most were not given copies. In some cases, workers were not given contracts at all.

In several cases documented by Human Rights Watch, employers retaliated against foreign migrant workers who protested abuses by denouncing them to the authorities, resulting in the workers’ expulsion from Russia. Cases like this highlight the vulnerable situation for migrant workers in Russia, particularly those without contracts to document their employment, Human Rights Watch said.

Human Rights Watch says that IOC intervention is urgently needed, but knowing the way IOC operates makes it highly unlikely that it will intervene in any meaningful way. 

And the HRW report is of course only the tip of the iceberg. There are already reports about a brewing mafia war involving prime property in Sochi. Russia's ranking as one of the most corrupt countries in the world will with 100% certainty make the 2014 Winter Olympic Games the most most corrupt games ever.