February 2, 2007 – The UCI would like to emphasize that it is the UCI ProTour Council that determines the conditions for participation in UCI ProTour calendar events, and not the organisers.

The UCI would like Paris-Nice to be a success. However, organisers who violate the rules of international cycling put themselves out of the running. In the case of Paris-Nice, it is the organiser, ASO, who puts its own race in danger by infringing upon the rules, and not the UCI. The UCI’s international cycling rules, aim to protect — in a fair manner — the rights of teams, riders and organisers. The UCI has the duty to ensure that teams’ rights are respected, by applying the same participation criteria to all organisers. It is not possible for organisers to create their own selection criteria. This can only lead to negative consequences.

ASO wishes to exclude the Unibet.com team (ranked second in its continental circuit last year ) from the 2007 Paris-Nice, but has invited another team with a lower ranking. This is illogical and demonstrates what can happen if the organisers are subjectively allowed to decide who is allowed to participate. That is why access to UCI ProTour and right of participation in UCI ProTour events on the calendar, are obtained along objective and transparent criteria, applied by a neutral authority, the Licence Commission.

ASO accuses the UCI ProTour of being a closed system, although it is hypocritically excluding a team itself, instead of respecting the participation conditions that have been democratically put in place through a transparent set of critera. In addition, the ASO’s actions go against the position maintained by the AIGCP (Association Internationale des Groupes Cyclistes Professionnels), which states only the UCI may set participation rules to events applicable for all.

The UCI would like to stress that the UCI ProTour is not a closed circuit, as ASO accuses. Since its launch, new teams have been allowed to join every year, and every season, new riders participate in UCI ProTour events.

However, the UCI considers that organizers ASO, RCS and Unipublic constitute a cartel of sorts that is detrimental to the interests of the teams and riders. For this reason, the UCI has lodged and official complaint against the Grands Tours with the European Commission.

The UCI urges the organisers of the Paris-Nice to respect international cycling rules and the rights of the riders and teams. The UCI will not compromise on this point, but it will remain open to dialogue in order to resolve the situation.