IOC defends Algerian boxer Imane Khelif after gender row

A spokesman for the International Olympic Committee said Friday two boxers at the centre of a controversy after one of them pulled out of a bout shortly after it had started, were eligible to fight as women.

"I think the question you have to ask yourself is, are these athletes women? The answer is yes according to eligibility, according to passports, according to their history," Mark Adams told a news conference in Paris.

Imane Khelif of Algeria won her opening Olympic boxing bout when opponent Angela Carini of Italy quit after just 46 seconds.

Khelif was disqualified from the 2023 World Championships after failing an unspecified gender eligibility test, and her presence at the Paris Olympics has become a divisive issue.

Carini and Khelif exchanged only a few punches before Carini walked away. Her headgear apparently became dislodged before she quit.

Carini didn’t shake Khelif’s hand after the decision was announced but cried in the ring.

Afterward, she said she quit because of intense pain in her nose after the opening punches.

She said she wasn’t making a political statement and wasn't refusing to fight Khelif.

Mark Adams told the news conference on Friday that Khelif was "born female, was registered female, lived her life as a female, boxed as a female, has a female passport."

He added: "This is not a transgender case. I know you're not saying that, but there has been some confusion that somehow it's a man fighting a woman. This is just not the case scientifically. On that there is consensus. Scientifically, this is not a man fighting a woman. And I think we need to kind of get that."

Khelif is an accomplished amateur who won a silver medal at the International Boxing Association's 2022 world championships.

The IBA — which has been banned from the Olympics since 2019 after years of disputes with the IOC — disqualified her from last year's championships shortly before her gold-medal match because of what it claimed were elevated levels of testosterone.

The 25-year-old entered the ring at the North Paris Arena to a chorus of cheers, but the crowd was confused by the bout's sudden end.

Italy coach Emanuele Renzini said he discussed the matchup with Carini and offered to allow her to back out earlier, but the boxer had been “very determined” to fight until the opening minute.

Khelif could clinch an Olympic medal with a victory in her quarterfinal bout on Saturday against Anna Luca Hamori, Hungary's first Olympic women's boxer.

The IOC repeatedly defended the boxers' right to compete this week. Olympic boxing reached gender parity for the first time this year, with 124 men and 124 women competing in Paris.

The IOC said it made its eligibility decisions on boxers based on the gender-related rules that applied at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

Several sports have updated their gender rules over the past three years, including World Aquatics, World Athletics and the International Cycling Union. The track body also last year tightened rules on athletes with differences in sex development.

The IOC is in charge of boxing in Paris because it has revoked the Olympic status of the IBA following years of governance problems, a lack of financial transparency and many perceived instances of corruption in judging and refereeing.

The IBA is controlled by president Umar Kremlev, who is Russian. He brought in Russian state-owned Gazprom as its primary sponsor and moved much of the IBA’s operations to Russia.

The IBA has since lost more than three dozen members who have formed a new group called World Boxing, which hopes to be recognized by the IOC as the sport’s governing body ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Games.

The IBA has aggressively seized on the two boxers’ presence in Paris to criticize the IOC. After the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld the IOC’s ban earlier this year, the IBA appealed to the Swiss Federal Tribunal in a last-gasp attempt to beat the IOC.

The banned body issued a statement Wednesday in which it claimed both boxers did not have a “testosterone examination” last year but were “subject to a separate and recognized test” for their disqualification. The IBA said the test’s “specifics remain confidential,” refusing to explain it.

The IBA disregarded IOC recommendations and allowed Russian fighters to compete at the 2023 World Championships under the Russian flag.

The governing body then disqualified Khelif only after Khelif defeated Russian boxer Azalia Amineva during the tournament.