Athletes participating in the Paralympic Opening Ceremony Parade
Twenty-eight NPCs to be represented by athletes in Verona 06 Mar 2026
The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) expects athletes from 28 of the 55 competing National Paralympic Committees (NPCs) to march during the Athlete Parade of tonight’s Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony.
In August, following feedback from Chef de Mission, the IPC Athletes’ Council and athletes, the IPC and Milano Cortina 2026 decided it would aim to strike a balance between in-person presence and remote engagement due to the travel times from the three Paralympic Villages to Verona.
With regards to in-person presence, NPCs were encouraged to send two athletes and two officials to the Ceremony, while athletes from each NPC were invited to be involved in short films that were recorded in the Paralympic Villages and will play out during tonight’s Athlete Parade. The flags of all NPCs will be carried by volunteers.
Twenty-eight NPCs have confirmed athlete attendance this evening in Verona, with many other NPCs not sending athletes for performance reasons due to competition taking place from 09:30 on Saturday in four of the six sports.
Seven NPCs have indicated they will not attend for political reasons. They are: Czechia, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine.
1. ANDORRA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
2. ARGENTINA
Enrique Plantey (Para alpine skiing)
Nicolas Lima (Para cross-country skiing)
3. ARMENIA
Garik Melkonyan (Para cross-country skiing)
4. AUSTRALIA
Georgia Gunew (Para alpine skiing)
Liana France (Para alpine skiing)
5. AUSTRIA
Michael Scharnagl (Para alpine skiing)
Markus Schmidhofer (Para snowboard)
6. BELGIUM
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
7. BELARUS
Lidziya Loban (Para cross-country skiing)
Valiantsina Biryla (Para cross-country skiing)
8. BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
Ilma Kazazic (Para alpine skiing)
9. BRAZIL
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
10. BULGARIA
Stela Yanchovichina (Para alpine skiing)
11. CANADA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
12. CZECHIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
13. CHILE
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
14. CHINA
Tiantian Li (Para snowboard)
Xiang Li (Para alpine skiing)
15. REPUBLIC OF KOREA
Chungmin Lee (Para snowboard)
Chaeyi Park (Para alpine skiing)
16. CROATIA
Dino Sokolovic (Para alpine skiing)
Lucija Smetisko (Para alpine skiing)
17. DENMARK
Adam Nybo (Para alpine skiing)
18. EL SALVADOR
David Chavez (Para cross-country skiing)
Jonathan Arias (Para cross-country skiing)
19. ESTONIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
20. FINLAND
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
21. GEORGIA
Temuri Dadiani (Para snowboard)
Valerian Lomaia (Para snowboard)
22. GERMANY
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
23. JAPAN
Shunsuke Nakamura (Para ice hockey)
Akari Fukunishi (Para ice hockey)
24. GREAT BRITAIN
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
25. GREECE
Athletes will not attend the Ceremony.
26. HAITI
Ralf Etienne (Para alpine skiing)
27. ICELAND
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
28. ISRAEL
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
29. KAZAKHSTAN
Anna Graceva (Para cross-country skiing)
Nurlan Alimov (Para cross-country skiing)
30. LATVIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
31. LIECHTENSTEIN
Sarah Hundert (Para alpine skiing)
32. LITHUANIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
33. NORTH MACEDONIA
Zoran Jovanovski (Para alpine skiing)
34. MEXICO
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
35. MONGOLIA
Dashdorj Tsegmid (Para cross-country skiing)
Ganbold Batmunkh (Para cross-country skiing)
36. MONTENEGRO
Andrej Sibalic (Para snowboard)
37. NORWAY
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
38. NEW ZEALAND
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
39. NETHERLANDS
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
40. POLAND
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
41. PUERTO RICO
Orlando Perez (Para alpine skiing)
42. PORTUGAL
Diogo Carmona (Para snowboard)
43. ROMANIA
Andrei Sorin Popa (Para alpine skiing)
44. RUSSIA
Anastasiia Bagiian (Para cross-country skiing)
Sergei Siniakin (Para cross-country skiing)
45. SERBIA
Luka Bilcar (Para alpine skiing)
46. SLOVAKIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
47. SLOVENIA
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
48. SPAIN
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
49. SWEDEN
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
50. SWITZERLAND
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
51. UKRAINE
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
52. UZBEKISTAN
Yulduz Makhmudova (Para alpine skiing)
Firdavs Khudoyatov (Para alpine skiing)
53. USA
Laurie Stephens (Para alpine skiing)
Josh Pauls (Para Ice Hockey)
54. FRANCE
Not sending athletes to the Ceremony.
55. ITALY
Chiara Mazzel (Para alpine skiing)
Rene’ De Silvestro (Para alpine skiing)