The news hit the stands worldwide that Vladimir Putin’s Russia controls the International Boxing Association (IBA). The news is old but it did not ring a bell until the Paris Olympics of 2024, when Italian boxer Angela Carini refused to fight Algerian boxer Imane Khelif, who was ostracized by the IBA.
Indeed, it was known that in 2019 the International Olympic Committee (IOC) stripped the IBA of its authority over boxing at the Olympics. That happened before Umar Kremlev, a Russian with ties to Putin, decided to move some of IBA’a operations to Russia, and sought sponsorship from the Russian state-controlled gas supplier, Gazprom.
The IOC took over the IBA role and now is spearheading the formation of a new world boxing federation, while Russian athletes are excluded from the Paris Olympics in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
Leave A Comment