Featured Image Credit: Aytac Unal/Anadolu via Getty Images
Topics: Olympics
Yasmeen Hamadeh
Boxer Lin Yu-ting, who was formerly disqualified from the women's International Boxing Association World Championships last year, has won her latest round against Uzbek boxer Sitora Turdibekova in the Paris Olympics.
Lin defeated Turdibekova in a 57 kg round-of-16 by an unanimous decision, therefore advancing her to the quarterfinals. Her opponent is yet to be announced.
The Taiwanese boxer, who's a two-time world champion, had previously failed the IBA's gender eligibility test in 2023.
Her fellow Olympian, Imane Khelif, was also dismissed from last year's world championships for a similar reason.
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The Algerian boxer has recently been caught under controversy following her match with Italy's Angela Carini, who requested to stop their fight after 46 seconds.
At the time of Lin and Khelif's dismissal from the 2023 championships, the IBA's president Umar Kremlev released a statement alleging that their gender and testosterone tests 'proved they had XY chromosomes.'
Neither Lin nor Khelif have publicly identified as transgender or intersex.
Notably, the International Olympic Committee suspended the IBA in 2019.
The committee then proceeded to withdraw its recognition of the IBA as a global governing body in June 2023 - which the IBA called a 'tremendous error', as per Reuters.
The IOC cited several reasons for its withdrawal including alleged issues with finance, governance, and ethics.
Moreover, the Olympics Committee criticized the IBA's dismissal of Lin and Khelif from the world championships last year, saying that they were 'victims of a sudden and arbitrary decision by the IBA.'
Both Lin and Khelif are listed as females in their passports and passed the Olympics' eligibility tests to compete in their respective sports.
Following pushback towards Lin and Khelif's participation in this year's Olympics, the IOC and Paris 2024 committee released a joint statement that read: "Towards the end of the IBA World Championships in 2023, [Lin and Khelif] were suddenly disqualified without any due process.
"The current aggression against these two athletes is based entirely on this arbitrary decision, which was taken without any proper procedure — especially considering that these athletes had been competing in top-level competition for many years.
"Such an approach is contrary to good governance.
"The IOC is saddened by the abuse that the two athletes are currently receiving. "Every person has the right to practice sport without discrimination."
Since Khelif's controversial fight, Carini has since come out expressing that she wishes to apologize to her opponent.
Speaking to Italian newspaper Gazzetta dello Sport, Carini shared: "I'm sorry for my opponent too. If the IOC said she can fight, I respect that decision."
"Actually, I want to apologize to her and everyone else," she added. "I was angry because my Olympics had gone up in smoke."
She added that if she meet Khelif again, she would 'embrace' her.