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“We want to know what happened” (daily newspaper Junge Welt)

Britta Pedersen / dpa-Zentralbild / dpa

Currently The last surveys of the study “Safe in Sport” are running on the subject of sexual assault, physical and psychological violence in organized sport. The evaluation should be available by the beginning of 2022. Are you plagued by stomach ache just thinking about it?

No, certainly not, on the contrary, it is very important for us to know these results. After the publication of the “Safe Sport” study on sexual violence in top-class sport, I already called for exactly that in 2017 in the sport committee: We also need reliable data for mass sport. Therefore, in the run-up to the hearing on child sexual abuse in sport, we expressly supported and shared the call to those affected to get in touch – precisely because we want to know what happened and how it came about. Knowledge of the extent and risk constellations is an indispensable basis for implementing our activities to protect against violence even more effectively.

Why was this national study commissioned by a dozen regional sports federations and not by the German Olympic Sports Confederation, where the threads should come together as the umbrella organization for sport?

The state sports federations are those who have direct access to the clubs and who also claim for themselves. That is why they are exactly the right people to implement the study on popular sport, which we at DOSB naturally support. In the best case all state sports federations would participate, but even so we will surely get a meaningful overall picture.

In February of this year, the “Athleten Deutschland” association suggested the establishment of a national “Safe Sport” center as an independent contact point for all victims of sexualised or other forms of violence in sport. Why is the idea “not the ideal solution” for the DOSB?

This statement referred to the independent center “Safe Sport” called for by “Athleten Deutschland”. We actually consider the idea of ​​such a facility for the various and far-reaching tasks in prevention, intervention and processing to be hardly realistic. That may be feasible for the relatively small area of ​​top-class sport – exactly for those who are active there, »Athleten Deutschland« is also committed. However, to do this across the board for the entire organized sport with its 90,000 clubs seems difficult to afford for such a center. Organized sport has long been active in the area of ​​prevention. He should develop this expertise and not transfer responsibility to a center. The DOSB, on the other hand, expressly supports the independent contact point for those affected in your question.

Why is the umbrella organization reluctant to this day to popularize this position paper by “Athletes Germany” on “Safe Sport” in its own ranks and to deal with it aggressively?

The DOSB is by no means reluctant. We take this issue very seriously, and it is also very important to me personally. We are in contact with “Athleten Deutschland” as well as with our member organizations. This is also evident in a large number of previous activities, such as the important resolution of the DOSB General Assembly 2019 to introduce the step model for prevention and protection against sexualised violence.

Last year they indicated that the DOSB would participate in the financial compensation of victims of sexual violence in sport. With what amount and in what way should this be done?

We have promised to participate in the so-called supplementary help system in order to provide financial support to those affected by sexual violence in sport. We are in talks with the Federal Ministry for Family, Seniors, Women and Youth and with our member organizations.

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