SAINT-DENIS, France (AP) — Three years ago, Krystsina Tsimanouskaya's Olympics ended in a dramatic standoff at a Tokyo airport when officials from the Belarus team tried to send her home against her will.
She's back at the Paris Olympics representing a new country and looking to settle some unfinished business.
“My No. 1 aim was go out there and run exactly that event that I wasn't able to run in Tokyo,” Tsimanouskaya told The Associated Press on Thursday after completing her last race of the Paris Olympics, running the 4x100-meter relay with the Poland team.
A diplomatic incident erupted at the Tokyo Games when the Belarus team sent Tsimanouskaya to the airport and she appealed to Japanese police for help. She had criticized Belarus' coaches after they tried to force her to enter the 4x400-meter relay, which she had never raced before.
She was barred from running her preferred race, the 200, and said that Belarusian officials tried to make her board a flight before the police at the airport intervened to help her. Tsimanouskaya said at the time she feared reprisals if she returned to Belarus and had been warned by her grandmother to stay away.
It was a year after President Alexander Lukashenko, Belarus' longtime authoritarian leader, had been re-elected in balloting widely seen by the opposition and Western countries as rigged. Protesters were met with violence from the security forces and many opposition members were either imprisoned or fled.
Tsimanouskaya received help to relocate to Poland, where she soon settled in. Now competing for Poland, she ran her preferred 200 and the 4x100 relay in Paris.
Tsimanouskaya lost in the new repechage round of the 200 and missed the relay final by .22 seconds Thursday, but says she wasn't too disappointed.
Two Belarusian coaches were stripped of their Olympic credentials over the Tokyo incident and one, Yury Moisevich, was banned from any role in track and field for five years in February after a tribunal ruled his actions were an abuse of power.
Tsimanouskaya speaks fluent Polish and says she feels accepted in Warsaw, where she works as a personal trainer and influencer and has discovered a love of painting. Her past in Belarus still follows her.
Tsimanouskaya said she has received online threats, and that she believed people had tried to follow her when she left the house, something she reported to the Polish authorities. In Paris, she said her new team warned her safety could be at risk.
There is no Belarus Olympic team in Paris because the International Olympic Committee barred the country along with its close ally Russia following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russian troops used Belarusian territory to launch their initial attack on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv.
Seventeen Belarusian athletes are competing at the Paris Olympics as Individual Neutral Athletes, along with 15 Russians. None are in track and field.
The IOC implemented strict vetting for the neutrals aimed at barring those with links to the military or security services, as well as any who supported the war publicly. Tsimanouskaya still finds it hard to relax, even at the Olympics.
“Before coming here, representatives of the (Polish) team warned me I'd better be on my guard and not leave the (Olympic) Village alone, because they too are worried that something could happen. And in Tokyo, for example, on the Belarus team there were KGB (security service) representatives," she said.
“So I wouldn't be surprised if there were some strange people even among these neutrals. And that's why, just because of that, I'm still a little worried for myself even now.”
AP Olympics coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, centre, of Poland, competes in the women's 200-meter repechage at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Monday, Aug. 5, 2024, in Saint-Denis, France. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, of Poland, gestures as she talks with teammates following their women's 4x100-meter relay heat at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Thursday, Aug. 8, 2024, in Saint-Denis, France. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Shaken by multiple militant attacks, Pakistani authorities have locked down the capital in a major security move as senior officials from several nations arrive for an Asian security group meeting.
A three-day holiday started Monday in normally bustling Islamabad and the nearby garrison city of Rawalpindi, and Pakistan has deployed troops and blocked key roads, making it difficult even for ambulances to pass through. Some doctors asked police to remove barricades so that they could go to hospitals, but were instead asked to take longer routes.
The main event of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization will be held Wednesday, when leaders and officials discuss how to boost their security cooperation and economic ties. The group was founded in 2001 by China and Russia to counter Western alliances. Other members include Iran, India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
Militants in recent weeks have killed dozens of people in multiple attacks in restive northwestern and southwestern Pakistan bordering Afghanistan. Security experts say militants have limited capacity to strike in Islamabad.
Pakistan often blames the outlawed Pakistani Taliban, who have sanctuaries in neighboring Afghanistan, for the violence. Afghanistan’s Taliban government says it does not allow anyone to use its soil for attacks against any country.
Two Chinese engineers were killed on Oct. 6 in a suicide bombing outside the airport in Karachi, the capital of southern Sindh province. The attack was claimed by a separatist group.
In the past, ordinary Pakistanis used to line up on both sides of the main roads to welcome any dignitaries visiting the country, but authorities said they had to take harsh security measures because of fears of militant attacks. Only state media will be allowed to cover the meetings.
Among those attending were China’s Premier Li Qiang, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref and the prime ministers of Kyrgyzstan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Mongolia.
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, China's Premier Li Qiang, left, walks Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, second left, upon his arrival at an airbase in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, China's Premier Li Qiang, right, greets Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, upon his arrival at an airbase in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, China's Premier Li Qiang, left, walks Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, upon his arrival at an airbase in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
A paramilitary soldier stands guard at a barricaded road leading to Presidency, in background, and to the venue of the upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Islamabad, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)
An army vehicle moves past a welcoming billboard with portraits of China's Premier Li Qiang, center, Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and President Asif Ali Zardari, displayed along a road leading to the venue of the upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Islamabad, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Anjum Naveed)
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, visiting China's Premier Li Qiang reviews the guard of honor during a welcome ceremony, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, China's Premier Li Qiang, third left, walks Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, third right, upon his arrival at an airbase in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
In this photo released by the Press Information Department, visiting China's Premier Li Qiang, left, and Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif attend a attends a welcome ceremony, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Monday, Oct. 14, 2024. (Press Information Department via AP)
