Ukraine Invasion: Paralympian withdraws from Beijing Games after her father captured by Russian troops
- Anastasiia Laletina withdraws from biathlon middle distance event after hearing about her father
- Dmytro Suiarko won his bronze medal a day after his house was destroyed by Russian shelling
A Ukrainian biathlete withdrew from a competition at the Beijing Paralympics after her father was captured by Russian troops.
Anastasiia Laletina did not race in the biathlon middle distance sitting event Tuesday after she heard her father, a soldier in the Ukrainian army was taken prisoner by Russian soldiers, team spokeswoman Nataliia Harach confirmed to USA Today on Tuesday.
“They beat him,” Harach said.
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Devastation in Ukrainian city of Irpin as Russian forces head within a breath of Kyiv
Laletina, 19, was tended to by a team doctor, Harach said. According to her International Paralympic Committee biography, Laletina began para Nordic skiing in 2019 in her native Chernihiv.
Harach added that an assistant coach’s home in Kharkiv was bombed recently.
Ukraine won nine out of the 18 medals awarded at Tuesday’s biathlon events. The podium success increased the country’s medal total to 17 – six gold, seven silver, four bronze – which is second behind China, who top the table with 27 medals. Canada is in third with 13.
Ukrainian biathlete Dmytro Suiarko, the bronze medallist in the middle distance vision impaired, won his medal a day after his house was destroyed by Russian shelling.
