Russian tennis player Vitalia Diatchenko was refused entry by Polish airline LOT when she was travelling for a tournament in Corsica via Warsaw and Nice.
The incident drew an angry response from the 250th-ranked athlete who took to her social media to highlight her plight.
“I slept at the airport, I was treated like a third-class citizen, spent a few thousand euro,” Diatchenko wrote on her social media.
In an emailed statement, LOT confirmed it hadn't allowed the player to board, citing restrictions introduced by Poland’s interior ministry during the COVID-19 pandemic and updated in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
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