Norway, Denmark, and Sweden said on Tuesday they will not play Russia at the 2027 men’s World Championship in Germany, citing safety and geopolitics. Their decision came days after a sports court cleared their return to international competition, according to Reuters.
Last week the Court of Arbitration for Sport allowed Russia back into International Ice Hockey Federation competition, overturning the suspension imposed after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
It is the latest in a run of reversals across sport this year, among them the International Olympic Committee’s reinstatement of Russia’s Olympic committee in July, which drew EU calls to strip the body of its funding.
Ukraine has condemned the decision, noting that Russia has killed more than 760 Ukrainian athletes and coaches since 2022.
The teams that won’t take the ice
“Norway will, based on the current situation and the information available to us today, not play against Russia at the World Championship in Germany in May 2027,” the Norwegian Ice Hockey Federation said.
Its other group games will go ahead as scheduled.
“Our position that Russia should be excluded from all international championships as long as the war in Ukraine continues remains unchanged,” the federation added.
Meanwhile, Sweden said its team would do the same, and that the decision had been coordinated.
“Our stance remains firm, and together with several other countries, we were in agreement that we would announce this decision jointly,” said Anders Larsson, chair of the Swedish Ice Hockey Association.
Denmark put it more bluntly.
“For the sake of the integrity of ice hockey, we cannot see ourselves playing against Russia as things stand,” said Henrik Bach Nielsen, chair of the Danish Ice Hockey Union.
All three said their other matches at the tournament would go ahead, and all three named player safety, including potential threats to their squads and coaching staff, as a core reason.
Cities and sponsors join in
The pushback reaches beyond the locker room. Finland’s ice hockey association, which said on Monday it would use every available means to keep Russia out, has led the charge, and officials in the Finnish city of Turku warned they would give up hosting the 2028 World Junior Championship if Russia takes part.
Sponsors are pulling out too: AJ Products, a Swedish furniture firm that has backed the men’s World Championship since 1989, announced it would withdraw from next year’s tournament over Russia’s participation. Finland’s Nokian Tyres said it would end its own sponsorship of the 2027 event on the same grounds. The 90th World Championship is set for 13 to 30 May in the German cities of Düsseldorf, Gelsenkirchen, and Mannheim.
Connexion
