The IOC is providing scholarships to 44 refugees with the potential to go to the 2024 Paris Games

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has awarded 44 scholarships to as many refugee athletes with the potential to compete in games in paris 2024, from twelve countries and living and training in another sixteen.

Twenty -three of them have already participated in Rio Games 2016 I Tokyo 2020. One of them is Venezuelan boxer Eldric Sella, a refugee in Uruguay who went to Tokyo; he was again awarded a scholarship with a purpose in the next edition.

came from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iraq, Iran, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria and Venezuela and compete in athletics, badminton, boxing, canoeing, cycling, judo, karate, shooting, swimming, taekwondo, weightlifting and wrestling.

Their refugee status was confirmed by United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the 16 National Olympic Committees that now host it are Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Portugal, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Switzerland, Turkey, the United States and Uruguay.

Nine are female. They fled from South Sudan, Iran, Eritrea and Syria.

Three of the scholarship recipients, the badminton player aram mahmoudCameroonian weightlifter Cyrulle Tchatchet and the Eritrean marathoner Tesfay Felfelehave a temporary scholarship because they are in the process of acquiring the nationality of their host countries shortly.

The one in Paris will be the third appearance at the Games of a Refugee Olympic Team, an initiative created by the IOC before Rio 2016.

This group and the Foundation that helps them were recently awarded el Princess of Asturias Award for Sports.