The Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine has released information on ten Russian athletes who participated in the war against Ukraine.
The data is published in the ‘Champions of Terror’ section of the War&Sanctions portal.
Ten Russian athletes, whose data was collected by the GUR in cooperation with the Ministry of Youth and Sports and the Centre for Countering Disinformation, entered Paralympic sports as part of rehabilitation programmes for participants in the so-called SVO.
A joint project of the Russian Paralympic Committee and the All-Russian public movement ‘Healthy Fatherland’ called ‘Heroes of Our Time’ aims to help participants of the so-called SVO who have become disabled.
With the help of Paralympic sports, participants in the invasion of Ukraine are being physically and socially rehabilitated.
Among the Russian parasportsmen who have been made public are:
Vladislav Shinkar — a member of the Russian Paralympic wheelchair fencing team, he was deputy commander of the battalion for armament and deputy commander of the battalion for personnel work in the Vostok battalion;
Anton Bushmakin — member of the national kayaking and canoeing team for people with musculoskeletal disorders, as well as a sapper and former marine, participant in combat operations near Avdiivka in Donetsk Oblast. He is the hero of the documentary film Shagay, in which he talks about his preparation for the Paralympics and his intention to participate in them under the Russian flag;
Tsiden Geninov is a member of the Russian Armed Forces team, a nominee for the title of ‘Best Athlete of 2025’ according to the International Military Sports Council (CISM), and a lieutenant in the Russian Armed Forces. He served in the 5th Separate Guards Tank Tantsinskaya Brigade, which took part in the offensive on the Kyiv region.
The statement notes that such Russian athletes should be excluded from the global sports community and barred from participating in international competitions, even under neutral status.