Already at the beginning of Russia's war of aggression in Ukraine, the presidium had formulated a clear position on this issue in March 2022. The Presidium has now confirmed this position once again, the federation announced in a press release. The DKV President Jens Perlwitz is quoted in a press release as follows: "Our unanimous position in the DKV Presidium has not changed in the past year. We show solidarity with Ukraine and fervently hope for peace."
KRV President Jürgen Joachim said of the DKV Presidium's decision, "We as a canoe regatta club are hosting the World Championships on behalf of the DKV. This means we are bound to the decisions of the federation and will of course follow them. This is all the easier for us because we share the assessment formulated by Jens Perlwitz." Jürgen Joachim added: "We too hope that the war in Ukraine will come to an end as soon as possible. In this case, we will certainly think again." He said he knows that no one makes it easy for them to make the decision to exclude athletes from an international competition. "That's another reason why peace in Ukraine is something we want very much. That would be in the spirit of our World Championships, but above all, our thoughts are with the people who are suffering the consequences of the war."
Jens Perlwitz had presented in the press release of the DKV: "We are aware that a reintegration of Russian and Belarusian athletes into the sports world, as proposed by the IOC, would be enormously difficult. Since nothing has changed in the situation in Ukraine since last year and peace is not foreseeable at the moment, there are hardly any possibilities how a reintegration could proceed."
The World Championships in Duisburg is not the only competition, hosted by the DKV, this year that is directly confronted with the exclusion issue. The World Championships in White Water Sprint in Augsburg are scheduled for mid-June and the European Championships in Canoe Polo in Brandenburg an der Havel in September.
