Cuban television attacks the International Olympic Committee for the inclusion of athletes in the refugee team.

Sports commentator and narrator Pavel Otero, one of the spokespersons for Cuban television, criticized the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Monday night for including two Cuban athletes in the Refugee Team (EOR) for the Paris 2024 Games.

In the sports segment of the Television News, Otero criticized the decision of the IOC and the UN Agency for Refugees (UNHCR) to select Fernando Dayán Jorge Enríquez, head of Tokyo 2020 in the canoe double at 1000 meters, and Ramiro Mora Romero, weightlifting.

After providing a brief historical overview of the EOR, an idea that materialized in the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Games, the journalist posed a series of questions: "Did these two Cuban athletes participate in a war that kept them away from Cuba? Are they persecuted because of the color of their skin or the religion they practice? Or were they expelled from Cuba due to their political beliefs?"

"We all know that is not the case," he responded before continuing: "Therefore, the IOC and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees have modified, to put it mildly, the original requirements and intentions for which this noble idea emerged to help refugee athletes or those persecuted around the world."

Furthermore, he issued a warning by mentioning that this could be the beginning of a very dangerous trend. "Can you imagine that from now on all Cuban athletes who emigrate for economic and personal reasons are welcomed and accepted in that category of refugees?"

Otero also pointed out that "Cuba has nothing against Fernando Dayán and the weightlifter Mora, and if they win their medal, we are not going to repudiate them because they are children of our land."

However, he forgot that when in March 2022, the Olympic canoeing champion left a Mexican delegation, the National Commission of that discipline qualified the decision of the athlete from Cienfuegos as a "serious indiscipline" and that he "turned his back on the commitment to new results for his sport and his people," as published on the JIT digital page.

Otero's comment seems to be part of a strategy by the regime against the IOC and the UNHCR, as on May 24, the official newspaper Granma also reacted angrily to the inclusion of the two athletes, going so far as to mention that they mixed "oil with vinegar."

To put it more clearly, they become complicit in the aggressive and criminal policies of the United States against Cuba, which has used talent theft and organized irregular migration - with all its human cost on top, because they do not care about life - with the aim of discrediting it, attacking one of its great achievements: its sports movement," declared the author of the article, Oscar Sánchez Serra.

The 25-year-old canoeist, who emigrated to the United States through the southern border route, recounted in an interview his perception of the Cuban reality after returning from the event in the capital of Japan, one month after the historic protests of July 11, 2021, known as 11J.

After spending three months on vacation after the Olympics, "that's when I really got into society, and where I really was living what all Cubans live," said Jorge Enríquez. "There were many moments when I was disappointed, when I didn't agree with the things that were happening."

During his migratory journey, the canoeist captured the attention of international media by assisting a young Cuban woman while they were crossing the Rio Grande. "What followed was a challenging period during which he had to work and train simultaneously in difficult conditions. Fernando now resides in Florida and trains daily in a canal near his home with the support of his coach, Alain," the IOC states in the athlete's biographical note.

Since then, he has persevered in his dream of returning to international competition. His talent was demonstrated in the United States by winning four gold medals at the National Sprint Canoeing Championship held in Sarasota, Florida.

The weightlifter Mora, on his part, landed in London from Havana like a trapeze artist in a circus in 2019. In 2023, he was proclaimed the national champion of the United Kingdom in weightlifting, including a record.