Mats Årjes temporarily withdraws from the position of chairman of the Swedish Olympic Committee and from the board of the International Ski Federation FIS.
16:01•Updated 16:28
Chairman of the Swedish Olympic Committee Mats Årjes is accused of sexual harassment in the district court of the city of Falun, several Swedish media reports.
According to Swedish media Expressen (you will switch to another service) it is about sexual harassment against a woman. The suspected crime took place on a train in June of this year. According to Expressen, Årjes has touched the woman inappropriately and spoken to her in a sexual manner.
Mats Årjes denies having committed the crime.
According to Årjes, the parties have completely “different ideas about what has happened” and it is a “word against word” situation.
– I consider myself completely innocent, Årjes says in an interview with SVT (you switch to another service).
Mats Årjes says that he is temporarily withdrawing from the position of chairman of the Swedish Olympic Committee and from the board of the International Ski Federation FIS.
Årjes, 55, is a long-time Swedish sports director who is, among other things, the honorary chairman of the Swedish Ski Association.
Årjes has served as the chairman of the Swedish Ski Association from 2008 to 2018. He started as chairman of the Swedish Olympic Committee in 2018.
In addition to this, he has worked as vice-president of the International Ski Federation FIS from 2010 to 2022.
Story edited on 28.11. at 4:02 p.m.: Changed wording sexual harassment to sexual harassment.