Author Topic: Iran's only female Olympic medalist says she has defected  (Read 604 times)

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Offline mountaineer

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Iran's only female Olympic medalist says she has defected
« on: January 12, 2020, 06:38:43 pm »
Iran's only female Olympic medalist says she has defected
January 12, 2020 / 9:19 AM
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DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran’s only female Olympic medalist has said on social media she had left her homeland because she had had enough of being used by its authorities as a propaganda tool.

Taekwondo champion Kimia Alizadeh, who won a bronze medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics, implied in an Instagram post that she had moved to Europe. ...  “No one has invited me to Europe and I haven’t been given a tempting offer. But I accept the pain and hardship of homesickness because I didn’t want to be part of hypocrisy, lies, injustice and flattery,” she said.   ...

Alizadeh said the Islamic Republic’s authorities had attributed her success to their management and the fact that she wore the Islamic veil, which is obligatory in Iran.

“I am one of the millions of oppressed women in Iran whom they’ve been playing for years... I wore whatever they told me and repeated whatever they ordered. Every sentence they ordered I repeated,” she wrote.  ...
More at Reuters
The abnormal is not the normal just because it is prevalent.
Roger Kimball, in a talk at Hillsdale College, 1/29/25

Offline TomSea

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Re: Iran's only female Olympic medalist says she has defected
« Reply #1 on: January 12, 2020, 07:07:09 pm »
Very good to post this, a major story I know to most. I should have earlier....Tae Kwon Doe champ. Good for her.

Offline mountaineer

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Re: Iran's only female Olympic medalist says she has defected
« Reply #2 on: January 12, 2020, 08:22:14 pm »

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... Alizadeh did not say where she was, amid reports that she has been training in the Netherlands. She made history for Iran in 2016 when she won a bronze medal in taekwondo at the Rio Olympics.  ...
More at BBC
« Last Edit: January 13, 2020, 03:35:53 pm by mountaineer »
The abnormal is not the normal just because it is prevalent.
Roger Kimball, in a talk at Hillsdale College, 1/29/25