IOC Says It Can’t Enforce Olympic Truce Amid U.S. War With Iran

In its first comments since the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran, the International Olympic Committee said Tuesday that its highly touted Olympic Truce—a United Nations-adopted resolution urging global peace and cooperation throughout the 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games—is “an aspirational and non-binding resolution” and conceded the IOC has “no means of enforcing” its calls for safe passage of athletes to the world’s largest sporting event.

The remarks by the IOC, which come just three days before the start of the Milan Cortina Paralympic Games, are a sharp contrast to the global sporting body’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which similarly began in the short window between the Winter Olympics and Paralympics in Beijing four years ago.

On Feb. 28, 2022, four days after Russia launched its war in Ukraine, the IOC described the invasion as an “extremely grave violation of the Olympic Truce” and consequently issued a number of immediate sanctions, including the suspension of athletes from Russia and its ally Belarus, and the urgent relocation of any global sporting events from those territories to other nations. In the ensuing days and weeks, at least 37 international sports federations—the bodies who administer rules and regulations for elite-level skiing, track and field, figure skating and other sports—issued similar statements.

By contrast, the IOC on Tuesday made no direct mention of the U.S., Israel, or Iran, nor any specific development beyond “the most recent conflicts.” Its remarks, titled “IOC statement on athletes’ safe passage” described “a world shaken by conflict, division and tragedy, with lives being lost and tragedies experienced by so many.”

The Olympic Truce begins one week before an Olympic Games and lasts until one week after the Paralympics end. In 2022, the U.S. was among the countries that did not co-sponsor the Olympic Truce resolution for the Beijing Games, explaining at the time in remarks before the UN General Assembly that the U.S. wished to remind China “of the need to comply with their human rights obligations and commitments.” Both the U.S. and Israel co-sponsored the Olympic Truce resolution for 2026.

The IOC has long considered itself politically neutral, and for years it has faced criticism for how, or whether, it acknowledges alleged human rights abuses by Olympic host nations. As recently as last month, IOC president Kirsty Coventry faced criticism for the sporting body’s refusal to allow a Ukrainian skeleton athlete to participate in the Milan Cortina Games due to the athlete’s intention to compete wearing a helmet emblazoned with other Ukrainian athletes who died in the conflict with Russia.

The lack of direct acknowledgment of the U.S. involvement in the new war with Iran comes as Los Angeles prepares to host the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2028. The U.S. has violated or exempted itself from the Olympic Truce in the past, including with previous military campaigns in the Middle East during the 1998 Olympics and in Afghanistan in 2002.

Sportico asked the IOC and the 37 international sports federations to comment on, and offer any relevant context, for the difference in response from the broader Olympic movement between the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran and the Russian war with Ukraine. The IOC pointed only to its statement issued Tuesday.

Of the sports federations, four responded. Describing the difference in response this week compared to 2022, a spokesman for World Climbing wrote in an email that “each situation is evaluated on its own facts, context and guidance from the Olympic Movement at the time. Decisions taken in 2022 were made within a specific regulatory and governance framework and in alignment with IOC recommendations issued at that time.”

The spokesman also said that no decisions have yet been made with regard to possible sanctions on U.S. or Israeli athletes, but that “any future measures would be assessed based in coordination with the IOC and relevant stakeholders.”

FIFA secretary general Mattias Grafström said Saturday that the global soccer organization is focused on having “a safe World Cup with everybody participating” later this year. That tournament will be co-hosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico, with the bulk of matches taking place in the U.S.

The international equestrian federation, FEI, said two competitions scheduled for this month in Qatar and the UAE have been canceled. The International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation said that “our World Cup season has finished and our sports are not part of the Paralympic Winter Games, so there is time for us to monitor the situation.”

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