Minister of Youth and Sports of Ukraine Vadym Gutzeit believes the Ukrainian 19-year-old athlete Yaroslava Mahuchikh simply did not hold back her emotions when she was photographed with a Russian athlete.

"I saw how she was happy, how she felt that she gave all her strength to this medal and this performance [...]. Every athlete, when he wins, starts to congratulate others, everyone congratulates each other. And she started to congratulate other athletes who were nearby, and there was an athlete with OCD from Russia nearby. At that time, she probably did not hold back her emotions," he said at a press conference in Kyiv on Thursday.

Gutzeit also called on everyone to support Mahuchikh, "so that it does not happen that now a lot of things are going on her, and then we did not see her in another country."

Among other things, the minister said he intends to work with the federations on how to behave for athletes in such situations.

Ukrainian athlete Mahuchikh in high jump won a bronze medal at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. After that, she was photographed with an athlete from Russia Maria Lasitskene, who became a gold medalist.