The key facts

  • Maria Zakharova called the statement by Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka unacceptable; her words were quoted by Match TV
  • Earlier, the secretary general of the Czech Ice Hockey Federation spoke out against the Russian team's return to international tournaments
  • On October 30, CAS upheld the appeal of the Russian Ice Hockey Federation and overturned the IIHF suspension decision

The Russian Foreign Ministry's reaction

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova criticized the statement by Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka about Russian female hockey players. “Only an effeminate man could say something like that,” Match TV quotes Zakharova as saying (Gazeta.Ru published a report on this). According to the outlet, the Czech foreign minister had earlier already made a statement regarding his remarks about the Russian women; the content of those statements is not disclosed in the publication.

Context: the CAS ruling and the Czech federation's position

The diplomats' statements come against the backdrop of a dispute over the Russian national team's return to the international stage. Earlier, the secretary general of the Czech Ice Hockey Federation, Jan Cerny, said that Czech hockey opposes the Russian team's return to international tournaments. Meanwhile, on October 30, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) fully upheld the appeal of the Russian Ice Hockey Federation and overturned the International Ice Hockey Federation's (IIHF) decision to suspend Russia. The IIHF stressed that it would urgently assess the steps and the time needed to implement the ruling and eliminate its operational consequences, but expressed dissatisfaction with the CAS decision. Thus, the legal suspension has been lifted, but the practical timeline for the team's return to tournaments remains uncertain, and the position of individual national federations, as follows from Cerny's remarks, remains negative.