Imane Khelif - Algerian boxer at heart of gender controversy row - wins gold at Paris Olympics
9 August 2024, 22:22 | Updated: 10 August 2024, 00:26
Imane Khelif - the Algerian boxer at the heart of a gender controversy row - wins gold at Paris Olympics.
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She defeated the reigning world champion China's Yang Liu in the women's 66kg final boxing match.
The 25-year-old was met by huge support and applause by swathes of Algerian support who waved the country's flag.
To tumbling chants of "Imane, Imane", Khelif scored a unanimous decision over her opponent dominating their three-round bout before being carried on a lap of honour around the arena by her jubilant cornermen.
Khelif's victory completed a remarkable nine days since she won her first-round bout over Italy's Angela Carini in just 46 seconds, sparking a global outcry which can only be expected to escalate in the wake of her comprehensive win.
Khelif and Chinese Taipei boxer Lin Yu-ting were both cleared to compete by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), despite being banned by the International Boxing Association (IBA) in 2023 for allegedly failing to meet gender eligibility criteria.
At a chaotic press conference staged by the discredited governing body in Paris last week, the IBA failed to provide any concrete evidence of the testing process or results.
The IBA has been barred from involvement in each of the last two Olympic boxing tournaments by the IOC over financial and corruption concerns and its president Umar Kremlev has repeatedly railed against the governance of IOC president Thomas Bach.
Kremlev, or the IBA, have variously alleged the presence of XY chromosomes or elevated testosterone levels in tests supposedly submitted by Khelif and Lin, but the presented evidence has often been contradictory and is as yet unsubstantiated.
Nevertheless, a tearful Carini's claim that she "had never been hit so hard" in the course of her brief Olympic appearance was seized upon by many public figures, including Donald Trump, Elon Musk and JK Rowling.
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