Winner of the international song contest "Eurovision-2024" Swiss singer Nemo (Nemo Mettler) refused the award because of the admission to participate in the event of Israel. He announced this on his page on the social network.
"Last year I won Eurovision and got a trophy for it ... but today I no longer feel that this trophy has a place on my shelf," the musician wrote.
He will recall that Eurovision has always declared its commitment to unity, inclusiveness and dignity.
"It was these values that made this contest significant for me. However, Israel's continued involvement in the events that the UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry has recognized as genocide demonstrates a clear conflict between these ideals and the decisions taken by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU)," Nemo explained.
In his opinion, when several countries refuse to participate in the competition at once, "it should be clear that something is deeply wrong."
"So I decided to send my trophy back to the EBU headquarters in Geneva," the singer concluded.
As reported by EADaily, last week four countries refused to participate in Eurovision 2026 due to the admission of Israel — Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands and Slovenia. This became one of the largest boycotts in the history of the contest, which has been held since 1956.
The day before, Iceland joined these countries, as announced by the country's state television and radio company RUV.
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