PARIS — Here come the Russians. Umar Kremlev, the Russian head of the International Boxing Association (IBA), the body suspended by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in 2019 before its final expulsion last year over governance and corruption issues, initiated the gender eligibility storm when he ordered the tests at the World Championships in March last year that led to the suspension of boxers Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting.
Three months later in June 2023 the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Switzerland upheld the IOC suspension of the IBA from the Olympic movement.
The furore surrounding Khelif and Lin can be seen as a consequence of the enduring bitterness between the two sporting bodies.
The IBA is headquartered in Switzerland but run out of Russia and backed by Russian energy giant Gazprom.
Its IOC expulsion resulted from the evidence presented by independent investigator Richard McLaren, who identified widespread corruption at London 2012 and Rio 2016.
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In the absence of a recognised federation to govern amateur boxing since the IBA suspension, the IOC assumed responsibility at Tokyo 2020 and here under the auspices of the Paris 2024 Boxing Unit (PBU).
The personnel at the PBU have not been identified and eligibility to box is based on assigned sex at birth and gender classification on passports, both of which state female in the cases of Khelif and Lin.
Until the results of the unspecified Delhi test, which allegedly identified the presence of X-Y chromosomes, present only in males, there was no reason to question the gender of either boxer.
The IOC discredited the validity of those tests, which in the case of Khelif was ordered before she contested the final of the World Championships after beating a Russian on the way, alleging they were political in nature, did not meet standard protocols and have not been verified.
So, as far as the PBU is concerned, there is no need for testing because there is no case to answer.
The issue blew up in the first round of the women’s boxing competition when Italian boxer Angela Carini withdrew after 46 seconds against Khelif to safeguard her health after claiming she had never been hit so hard.
The IBA immediately criticised the IOC, accusing it of facilitating injustice by allowing Khelif to fight with an unfair advantage.
IBA president Umar Kremlev is understood to be a close ally of Vladimir Putin (Photo: Getty)
Kremlev has since upped the ante by pledging 50,000 euros to Carini, plus the same sum to her coach and the Italian boxing federation, to match the cheque received by gold medallists at these games.
IBA CEO Chris Roberts in an interview with the BBC reaffirmed the validity of the tests, claiming they were supervised by the association’s medical staff following alleged complaints by a number of international boxing federations about Khelif and Lin.
None of the federations were identified and Roberts claimed confidentiality prevented him discussing any of the details about the nature of the tests other than to confirm they took place and assert the results were valid.
The political tension at the heart of this dispute is further complicated by the case of Caster Semenya, the South African double Olympic 800m champion banned from competing as a woman by World Athletics in 2018 after she was identified as a woman affected by DSD (Differences in Sex Development) with heightened testosterone levels. The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights is still deliberating the case.
Initially the Court of Arbitration’s approval of her ban by World Athletics on grounds of fairness of competition was backed by the Swiss government. However, the Court of Human Rights subsequently decided that Semenya’s human rights had in fact been violated by the government’s support of CAS. The government immediately took their appeal to the Grand Chamber.
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The outcome will have a huge bearing on the IOC’s stance regarding Khelif and Lin since they, like many sporting bodies, are based in Switzerland and are therefore subject to Swiss law. Clearly the Grand Chamber’s ruling will frame any IOC response.
The IOC have effectively called the IBA’s bluff by demanding they publish both the process and method of testing, at both the World Championships in Delhi last year and the year previously in Istanbul, where it is claimed Khelif and Lin also failed tests.
In response the IBA are to hold their own press briefing in Paris on Monday, to explain in detail the reasons for the expulsions.
The briefing is to be attended by Roberts, Dr Ioannis Filippatos, former chair of the IBA Medical Committee, IBA Head of Sport, Marko Petric, and Gabriele Martelli, IBA Coaches Committee Chairman.
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