Gender-row Olympic boxer Lin Yu-ting won't compete at worlds, says official

TAIPEI – Taiwanese Olympic boxing gold medallist Lin Yu-ting will not compete at the world championships starting this week, the Chinese Taipei boxing association said on Sept 2, despite reportedly submitting her sex test results.

Lin and Algerian boxer Imane Khelif were at the centre of a major gender row at the 2024 Paris Olympics, where they won titles in separate weight classes.

World Boxing reiterated in August that women wanting to compete at the championships in Liverpool on Sept 4-14 would have to undergo mandatory sex testing under its new policy.

The organisation first announced its decision in May.

The 29-year-old Lin had agreed to undergo the testing, her coach Tseng Tzu-chiang told AFP at the time.

The Chinese Taipei boxing association then said it submitted the results to World Boxing and had not received a response, the semi-official Central News Agency reported late on Sept 1.

“We cannot allow the athlete to travel to the UK without any guarantee,” it was quoted as saying.

The association told AFP in a message on Sept 2 that Lin “will not attend the world championships in Liverpool”, but did not give a reason or respond to AFP’s other questions.

Lin’s coach Tseng also did not respond to phone calls or messages, while AFP has contacted World Boxing for comment.

Under its policy, fighters over 18 who want to participate in a World Boxing-sanctioned competition need to take a polymerase chain reaction genetic test to determine their sex at birth.

Lin and Khelif were excluded from the International Boxing Association’s (IBA) 2023 world championships after the IBA said they had failed sex eligibility tests.

However, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) allowed them both to compete at the 2024 Paris Games, saying they had been victims of “a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA”. Both went on to triumph.

The duo were subjected to attacks on social media, rumours about their biological sex and disinformation during the Games.

Khelif, meanwhile, has turned to sport’s top court in an attempt to overturn the introduction of the gender test.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) said in a statement that Khelif was challenging World Boxing’s decision “that disallows the athlete’s participation in upcoming World Boxing events without a preliminary genetic test”.

She filed her appeal on Aug 5, CAS added, seeking to overturn the global body’s decision and allow her to enter competitions, including the world championships, “without a test”.

However, CAS said that it had “dismissed a request to suspend the execution of the decision by World Boxing until the case is heard”, meaning that Khelif has almost no chance of competing in Liverpool if she does not take the test.

The debate about eligibility in women’s sports categories has not just affected boxing but has also sucked in athletics and swimming.

In late May, World Boxing announced that it was introducing mandatory gender testing to determine the eligibility of male and female athletes wanting to take part in its competitions.

The genetic sex test was used at the Olympics between 1968 and 1996, after which it was abandoned.

In June, new IOC president Kirsty Coventry said the body would set up a gender working group and vowed to take a “scientific approach” to the inflammatory issue of eligibility for the female categories.

Khelif in August also denied claims made by her former manager that she was putting her career on hold amid all the controversy.

“I would like to make it clear to the public that the reports of my retirement from boxing are false,” the 26-year-old wrote on Facebook.

She accused her former manager, Nasser Yefsah, of “betraying (her) trust and (her) country with his false and malicious statements”.

“This person no longer represents me in any way,” she said. AFP