For peace and reconciliation on the Korean peninsula, Thomas Bach even wanted to override UN sanctions.

"Sport" must "build bridges", stressed the IOC President around the 2018 Winter Games in Pyeongchang - including to the internationally outlawed North Korea.

But the diplomatic thaw is now over, and the relationship between the International Olympic Committee and ruler Kim Jong Un has cooled down.

The North Korean NOK now felt this.

Bach's executive suspended the organization for not participating in the Tokyo Games until the end of 2022, including threatening to extend the sanction. At the Winter Games in Beijing (from February 4), North Korean athletes should only start under a neutral flag - if at all. The diplomatic bridge building is history, the IOC is taking action - for its circumstances even unusually consistent. In any case, North Korea's NOK will have to forego support for the time being, including financial support.

North Korea's National Olympic Committee announced in early April that it would not send a team to Japan for fear of the corona pandemic.

Before the Olympics, the IOC said it had "given assurances that the Games would be carried out safely and made constructive proposals for an appropriate and tailor-made solution up to the last minute", "including the provision of vaccines".

These proposals were "systematically rejected" by the NOK of North Korea.

"Limited influence"

Experts on North Korea's foreign policy quickly agreed that the tense relationship with Japan was the more likely reason for the rejection. South Korea took note of the decision "with regret" after the rapprochement in Pyeongchang in 2018, when the warring countries celebrated the opening with a joint team and played ice hockey in the women's tournament, so efforts for peace on the sporting stage came to a halt. There is also hardly any talk of a joint application for the Olympic Games. The violation of the Olympic Charter is reason enough for the IOC to promptly sanction North Korea.

In the case of Belarus, however, the investigations of the Rings Organization continue. After the athlete Kristina Timanovskaya escaped from her own NOK, who caused a stir around the world during the Tokyo Games, the IOC did not report any new status Human rights violations in the upcoming Olympic host country China, President Bach expressed only evasively.

"The IOC's responsibility is to take care of humanitarian issues in the Olympic community," said Bach, pointing out that its influence is "limited."

Critics accuse the IOC of supporting the government, which is accused of genocide against the Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region, by awarding the 2022 Winter Games to China.