The athlete Elnas Rekabi was allegedly abducted after climbing without a headscarf. Why are sanctions so little discussed in sport?
Elnas Rekabi was celebrated as a heroine online Photo: Rhea Kang/ap
Solidarity with Elnas Rekabi is great. On the night of Tuesday, numerous Iranians are said to have made their way to the airport in Tehran to strengthen the climber’s back and to celebrate her as the new symbol of the women’s protests. But security forces only let people with valid airline tickets through at roadblocks in the capital. The 34-year-old Rekabi had removed her hat in the final of the Asian Championships in Seoul.
The power of this protest gesture was reflected in the social networks, where it was rapidly spread and acclaimed. And at the same time there is growing concern about the consequences Elnas Rekabi has to fear for her behavior. The BBC reported that the Iranian climbing team left the competitions in South Korea early after the incident and immediately traveled back to Tehran. Rekabi is said to have had his passport withdrawn prematurely. The rumor mill is churning.
The Iranian secret service and representatives of the National Olympic Committee are said to have been involved in the repatriation of the athletes. The website critical of the regime Iran Wire reported the athlete was on her way to the notorious Evin Prison. On Tuesday, Rekabi spoke up via Instagram. She accidentally did not wear the headscarf. It takes a lot of imagination to believe in such a mishap in these times. It takes less imagination to see the massive government pressure behind this statement.
The hubbub of voices is huge at the moment. But where has the voice of the representatives of organized international sport actually gone? One would like to hear that the protection of their athletes is a priority for them. And the right to self-determination over one’s own body should be loudly defended anyway.
Eerily quiet at Fifa
But it was also eerily quiet inside FIFA when prominent Iranian footballers showed their solidarity with the protest movement in Iran and were then arrested or, like the former Bundesliga professional Ali Daei, were tamed by state authorities with the confiscation of their identity cards. And the world association has not yet responded to the call by the women’s rights movement Open Stadiums to Fifa to exclude Iran from the World Cup in Qatar.
It is debatable whether an exclusion would be the right measure in this case. Finally, the selection players who have already expressed criticism of the regime would be deprived of a large and influential stage to express their protest. But why aren’t even the mildest possible sanctions, such as the banning of national symbols such as flags and national anthems, discussed so shortly before the big event?
In the case of the Iranian judoka Saeid Mollaei, the International Judo Federation showed how things can be done at a time when the situation in the Persian Gulf was not yet so acute. The Iranian Judo Association wanted to force its former world champion Mollaei to give up early at the 2019 World Cup in order to prevent a possible later fight against the Israeli Sagi Muki. Mollaei, who nevertheless competed, made this public himself and fled to Germany after the tournament.
The world association then suspended the Iranian association indefinitely. After the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) declared this to be unfair, the ban was limited to September 2023. A serious breach of its statutes and the “fundamental principles of Olympism” were cited as justification. Apparently that was the case then as it is now.
Smaller international sports federations, which are less visible to the public, certainly find it easier to push through clear decisions. However, the silence of Fifa and the IOC on what is happening in Iran is telling. The athletes, not only in Iran, can once again notice that in case of doubt their integrity is secondary.
