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Algerian Boxer Imane Khelif Clinches Medal at Paris Olympics

Boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria (The AP)
Boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria (The AP)
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Algerian Boxer Imane Khelif Clinches Medal at Paris Olympics

Boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria (The AP)
Boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria (The AP)

Boxer Imane Khelif of Algeria clinched a medal Saturday at the Paris Olympics following days of sharp scrutiny and online abuse as misconceptions about her gender have exploded into a larger clash about identity in sports.

Khelif defeated Anna Luca Hamori of Hungary 5:0 in the quarterfinals of the women’s 66-kilogram bout, The AP reported.

Khelif will win at least a bronze medal after defeating Hamori for the second victory of her tumultuous second trip to the Olympics.

Khelif has faced international scrutiny after the banned International Boxing Association claimed Khelif failed an unspecified eligibility test for women’s competition last year. She then won her opening bout Thursday when opponent Angela Carini of Italy tearfully abandoned the fight after just 46 seconds.

The unusual ending became a sharp wedge to drive into an already prominent divide over gender identity and regulations in sports, drawing comments from the likes of former US President Donald Trump, “Harry Potter” writer J.K. Rowling and others falsely claiming Khelif was a man or transgender.

IOC President Thomas Bach on Saturday defended Khelif and fellow boxer Lin Yu-ting of Taiwan. Khelif and Lin were disqualified in the middle of last year's world championships by the International Boxing Association, the now-banned former governing body of Olympic boxing, after what it claimed were failed eligibility tests for the women's competition.

"We are talking about women's boxing. We have two boxers who were born as women, raised as women, who have passports as women and who have competed for many years as women and this is a clear definition of a woman," Bach told a press conference.
"There was never any doubt about them being women."
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Only Woman to Compete at 10 Olympics Says she's Retiring

Georgia's Nino Salukvadze gestures as she competes in the 25m pistol rapid women's qualification round at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Chateauroux, France. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
Georgia's Nino Salukvadze gestures as she competes in the 25m pistol rapid women's qualification round at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Chateauroux, France. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
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Only Woman to Compete at 10 Olympics Says she's Retiring

Georgia's Nino Salukvadze gestures as she competes in the 25m pistol rapid women's qualification round at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Chateauroux, France. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)
Georgia's Nino Salukvadze gestures as she competes in the 25m pistol rapid women's qualification round at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Friday, Aug. 2, 2024, in Chateauroux, France. (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

After 10 Olympic Games and 36 years, Nino Salukvadze says she's finally done.
The pistol shooter from Georgia has been ever-present at the Summer Olympics since Seoul 1988, when she competed for what was still the Soviet Union. At the 2024 Olympics, she became the first female athlete ever to compete at the Games 10 times.
In that time, the 55-year-old has seen the Games become bigger, more professionalized and says the competition is tougher than ever.
Salukvadze considered retiring after her first Olympics 36 years ago, after she'd won gold and silver medals as a 19-year-old. She nearly walked away in the 1990s, when she struggled to support her family financially in newly independent Georgia. She announced her retirement after the Tokyo Games in 2021.
This time, though, she says she is done “for sure."
Coming to the Paris Olympics was about honoring her father Vakhtang, who was also her coach. After the pandemic-delayed Olympics in Tokyo in 2021, he talked her out of retirement for one last push.
“He was my mentor not only in sports, but also in life. He was a wise man,” she told The Associated Press in the city of Chateauroux, near the Olympic shooting range, on Friday after her last competition.
“He never asked for anything in his life. We had the kind of relationship where we understood each other just with our eyes," Salukvadze said.
“‘If you quit sports, you can’t come back. Just try,'” she recalls her father saying. "It was the only favor he asked me for his whole life. I thought he perhaps wouldn’t be able to ask again. I gathered all my strength, for his sake.”
Salukvadze's father died earlier this year at the age of 93, but lived to see his daughter qualify for a Paris Olympic spot for Georgia.
From her 10 Olympics, Salukvadze has three medals: one gold, one silver and one bronze. At the 2024 Olympics, she placed 38th in the 10-meter air pistol event and 40th in the 25-meter pistol, meaning she didn't reach a televised final.
Salukvadze's last Olympic medal — and her first for an independent Georgia — was in Beijing in 2008. At the time, Georgia was at war with neighboring Russia. Salukvadze won bronze and embraced Russian silver medalist Natalia Paderina on the podium in what was widely seen as a gesture for peace.
Salukvadze may not be totally done with the Olympics yet. She's a coach at her own shooting club back home in Georgia, and is a vice-president of the national Olympic committee.
Even after 36 years, nothing quite matches the feeling of winning an Olympic gold medal as a teenager back in 1988.
“When I won at the Olympics and stood on the podium, it was indescribable,” she said. Even now, Salukvadze added, “I can evoke these feelings in myself in the same way, feel it just the same.”