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Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te has celebrated Lin Yu-Ting’s Olympic gold medal by calling her a “daughter of Taiwan,” during the ongoing gender row.
The 28-year-old has made the headlines in Paris, for the wrong reasons, as she and Algerian boxer Imane Khelif were at the centre of a gender eligibility row that engulfed the boxing competition.
The fighters were allowed to compete in Paris despite being disqualified from last year’s World Championships after reportedly failing unspecified gender eligibility tests.
The International Boxing Association (IBA) says blood testing on the two fighters was conducted in May 2022 and March 2023, and that the results “conclusively indicated” that the pair “didn’t match the eligibility criteria for IBA women’s events”.
But the International Olympic Committee (IOC), who suspended the IBA in 2019 amid integrity and governance issues, and then stripped it of its official status last year, justified their decision to allow Lin and Khelif to compete because the testing was “impossibly flawed” and that the pair were “born and raised as women”.
Following Lin’s victory in the 57kg final, which secured Taiwan its first-ever Olympic gold medal in boxing, President Lai wrote on X: “With admirable focus and discipline, she has overcome misinformation and cyberbullying, turning adversity into victory.”
President Lai has previously asked his administration to pursue legal action over the “malicious attacks and bullying” Lin had suffered.
Khelif, who was competing in the 66kg competition, also won gold and said that the “attacks” over her gender eligibility gave her victory a “special taste”.
“I am fully qualified to take part in this competition,” said the 25-year-old Khelif. “I am a woman like any other woman.
“I was born a woman. I have lived as a woman. I competed as a woman - there is no doubt about that.”
