It was the full hero’s welcome for Imane Khelif on her return home from Paris to Algiers. An open-topped bus parade on a humid evening that had followed a meeting with president Abdelmadjid Tebboune in the El Mouradia Palace where she was granted the honorary title of major in the Algerian army.
The celebrations were only a little more muted on the other side of the world, where Lin Yu-ting, lauded as the “daughter of Taiwan” by its president, was the honoured guest at a sumptuous banquet put on by her sponsors Yumark Enterprises.