BLAST announces the exclusion of Russian organisations from its events until further notice. The Ukrainian organisation NAVI ends its cooperation with the Russian ESFORCE Holding.
The war in Ukraine reaches esports. Tournament organiser BLAST and organisation Natus Vincere reacted on Tuesday with measures regarding cooperation with organisations from Russia.
Tournament organiser BLAST, based in Denmark, announced on Twitter that no teams based in Russia will be invited to its competitions in the foreseeable future. The organiser said this was in response to the “conflict in Ukraine”.
– BLAST Premier (@BLASTPremier) March 1, 2022
Currently affected by the BLAST exclusion is the “WePlay CIS Masters: Spring 2022” qualifying tournament, which was planned for the end of March and has now been cancelled, for which the Russian teams Entropiq and forZe as well as K23 and Virtus.pro were previously confirmed as participants. The winner would have participated in the BLAST Spring Showdown.
Statement by s1mple
The Ukrainian organisation Natus Vincere (NAVI) announced almost simultaneously on Twitter that it was ending its cooperation with the Russian ESFORCE Holding. ESFORCE acts as a promoter, publicist in Russia and runs the esports organisation Virtus.pro. NAVI cites ESFORCE’s “public denial of the horror taking place in Ukraine” as the reason.
– NAVI (@natusvincere) March 1, 2022
Natus Vincere competes in the Esport discipline Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, among others. The team around the Ukrainian star Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev is the reigning Major Champion and last played at the Intel Extreme Masters in Katowice. There, s1mple had made a moving statement about the war in Ukraine last Friday before the start of the playoffs in the Spodek Arena. One day before, his hometown Kiev was attacked for the first time.
️ @s1mpleOIEM pic.twitter.com/nQjH576Cqa
– ESL Counter-Strike (@ESLCS) February 25, 2022
In addition to esports, other sports federations have also reacted to the situation in Ukraine. FIFA and UEFA excluded Russian football teams from their competitions on Monday. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) also recommended on the same day that Russian and Belarusian teams be excluded from international competitions.
