Instead of signing a contract in the USA in the best ice hockey league in the world, Ivan Fedotov is stuck in the Arctic. The Russian military forcibly recruited the goalkeeper. His lawyer has now announced that he will appeal and hopes for a quick decision.
The conscripted ice hockey star Ivan Fedotov wants to sue against his conscription to Russia's Northern Fleet. "The documents were sent on Friday, we are waiting for the court to accept them and then we will move towards the trial," Alexei Ponomaryov, the 25-year-old's lawyer, said, according to the Russian state news agency Ria Novosti. According to him, Fedotov is already at the naval base in Severomorsk, in northern Russia, near Murmansk.
Fedotov won the Gagarin Cup with CSKA Moscow last season and was named the best goalkeeper in the Russian ice hockey league KHL. From the next season, however, he should appear for the Philadelphia Flyers from the North American league NHL. On Friday, however, he was arrested by military police in St. Petersburg for alleged conscientious objection and taken to a district military replacement office.
After several hours of interrogation, the athlete became ill and had to be hospitalized. However, he was then immediately drafted into the Russian armed forces. His lawyer, Ponomarev, called the draft commission's decision illegal.
On Tuesday, the first photos of Fedotov in his new unit appeared on the Telegram channel "Mash". Accordingly, he was transferred to the sports company of the Northern Fleet and is to keep the goal there for the coming year at the "Avantgarde" club, which belongs to the military base. Military sources had previously said that Fedotov would be transferred to the polar island of Novaya Zemlya, which is also known as the former Soviet atomic bomb test site.
Fedotov's fate also increases concerns in the NHL. There is great concern as to whether all of their Russian professionals will be allowed to travel to Canada and the USA again for the new season. "I think a lot of us are concerned," said Todd MacLellan, general manager of the Washington Capitals. Nobody knows what will happen. It could be that the players are refused departure: "There are many questions, but no answers." That's why MacLellan and his NHL colleagues also asked their Russian professionals to spend the summer in North America or in the EU. Most of them, however, traveled back to their homeland, to their families.
