The organisation’s Executive Committee met today and announced that the flags of Russia and Belarus must not be displayed, and the countries anthems played, at any FIG competitions until further notice.

All FIG World Cup and World Challenge Cup events scheduled to take place in the countries are cancelled, while Russia and Belarus will not be allocated any such events until further notice.

Events impacted by this decision are the FIG Acrobatics World Cup that was due to be held in Oktyabrskiy in May and the FIG Challenge World Cup in rhythmic gymnastics that was scheduled to take place in Moscow in August.

FIG also say any FIG-sanctioned events due to take place in either Russia or Belarus will be removed from its calendar and not recognised by the organisation.

"As a sporting governing body, our first duty is to protect all our athletes, including to protect them from political pressure," said FIG President Morinari Watanabe.

"Our thoughts go to the members of the gymnastics community in Ukraine. Sport is friendship and solidarity.

"We must show solidarity with the members of our family who are in despair and offer them a helping hand to ensure their future."

The FIG Foundation for Solidarity is set to allocate special aid to support Ukrainian athletes and other members of the Ukrainian Gymnastics Federation impacted by the conflict.

A long-time sponsor of FIG has been Russian bank VTB, which has provided financial support to FIG since 2009.

VTB does not currently appear on the partners section of the FIG website.

A FIG spokesperson told insidethegames that "FIG has no current contract with VTB."