Ukraine blamed a Russian disinformation campaign Thursday after fake news posted online about its Winter Olympics team, including a story criticising an athlete disqualified for trying to highlight war deaths.

The luge team representing Ukraine took a collective knee, raising their helmets over their heads after the relay event in solidarity with disqualified teammate Vladyslav Heraskevych.

Teammates show solidarity with Vladyslav Heraskevych, who says he is not violating IOC rules because remembrance is not a political statement.

The IOC announced its decision to remove his accreditation before Heraskevych's first heats Thursday in Cortina d'Ampezzo.

Ukrainian skeleton pilot Vladyslav Heraskevych was banned from competing at the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics.

Ukraine's Sports Minister Matvii Bidnyi believes the decision to disqualify Vladyslav Heraskevych from his skeleton event at the Milano Cortina Games was unjust but told Reuters there was no question of his team pulling out of the Olympics.

The skeleton event at the Winter Olympics has suffered a helmet controversy, with a Ukrainian athlete disqualified for paying homage to compatriots who have died in the war with Russia

The team relay will be the final luge event of the Milan Cortina Olympics and will take place Thursday in Italy.

Vladyslav Heraskevych, a skeleton athlete for Team Ukraine, was disqualified after refusing to change helmets at the Milan Cortina Games.

Olympic officials have long sought to limit political demonstrations and displays at the Games. IOC restrictions on such protests date back more than seven decades, to the 1955 Olympic Charter, though their parameters—and athletes’ response to them—have changed with the intervening years.