Sabres legend Dominik Hasek, who has called for the NHL to ban Russian players because of their country’s attack on Ukraine, apologized Tuesday morning for taking part in the pregame ceremony last week before the Sabres played the Chicago Blackhawks at KeyBank Center.
In a series of tweets, Hasek said he was making his annual visit to Buffalo for business and charity events and was asked to participate by the “fans and the Buffalo Sabres club.”
Hasek has spoken out extensively about how the NHL has allowed Russian players to continue to play and last summer called for the NHL to send $2 billion to $4 billion to Ukraine in compensation. He proposed to NHL commissioner Gary Bettman that the NHL should pay off the contracts the Russian players signed as a way of banning them. Otherwise, he said, the NHL is partially responsible for what’s going on in Ukraine.
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He also has called for the Russians to openly condemn the war in Urakine or be banned from the Olympics. He has decried the International Olympic Committee’s decision to allow athletes from Russia and Belarus to compete as neutral.
“I’m convinced that we all, the whole democratic world, have to do all we can to prevent the Russian and Belarusian athletes from participating under the current conditions,” Hasek told the Associated Press in June.
IOC officials have said the Olympic body could make its own decision on the Russian athletes issue “at the appropriate time” but also said that excluding them on the basis of their passports alone was discrimination.
Here is Hasek’s full statement from Tuesday:
“Statement on my participation in the event 01/18/2024 and to the public and the media inquiries: On my annual visit (business, charity) to Buffalo USA, I accepted an invitation from my friends to the @NHL game (1/18/2024). At the same time, at the request of the fans and the Buffalo Sabers club, I agreed to actively participate in the “kick-off” of the start of this game @BuffaloSabres – @NHLBlackHawks.
The NHL’s current stance is this. Since the Russian attack (2/24/2022) on the free democratic country of Ukraine, the @NHL has allowed Russian citizens (players) to publicly perform (play) without officially denouncing Russia’s war of aggression and Russian crimes related to that war and acting accordingly. In doing so, the NHL makes a huge advertisement for the Russian imperialist war and crimes. That is why the @NHL became and is responsible for the loss of human life and the enormous material damage in this war.(Let me just point out that the BS team does not currently have any hockey players. However, it is part of the NHL, where several dozen of them play)
Due to this, I consider my participation in the match and…
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