IOC grants provisional recognition to global body World Boxing
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The Olympic body said World Boxing had met several key criteria.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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BERLIN – The International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Feb 26 granted provisional recognition to World Boxing in a major step towards the sport’s inclusion in the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.
The boxing competition at the Paris 2024 Olympics was run by the IOC, after it stripped the International Boxing Association (IBA) of recognition in 2023 over its failure to implement reforms on governance and finance.
The IOC has not included the sport on the LA 2028 programme yet, having urged national boxing federations to create a new global boxing body or risk missing out on the Olympics.
World Boxing was launched in 2023 and has now 78 members across five continents.
“The assessment concluded that World Boxing has continued to make progress regarding the identified areas of consideration in order to be recommended for IOC Provisional Recognition as the International Federation within the Olympic Movement governing... boxing at world level,” the IOC said in a statement.
The Olympic body added that World Boxing had met several key criteria.
Among them were sufficient members across five continents, application of the sports integrity process implemented during the Paris Games, including with independent oversight and good governance structures, as well as assurances on revenues and signing up to the World Anti-Doping Code. It also has recognised Court of Arbitration for Sport jurisdiction.
The recognition, even though it is still provisional, means the sport can now push towards its Olympic inclusion in 2028, having overcome the biggest hurdle in relation to the Olympics – which was the creation of a new global body.
“This is a very significant day for everyone connected with the sport of boxing in the Olympic movement,” said World Boxing president Boris van der Vorst.
“Keeping its place at the Olympic Games is absolutely critical to the future of our sport at every level... This decision by the IOC takes us one step closer to our objective of seeing boxing restored to the Olympic programme.
“There is still a lot of work to do, and everyone is as committed as ever to continuing to work together and doing everything within our power to ensuring that boxing remains at the heart of the Olympic movement.”
The IOC suspended the IBA in 2019 over governance, finance, refereeing and ethical issues. It did not involve the IBA in running the boxing events at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, before stripping it of recognition in 2023, an extremely rare move by the IOC. REUTERS
