Beijing Olympics: underage gymnastics row stalled

Beijing Olympics: underage gymnastics row stalled
An investigation into allegations that China fielded underage gymnasts at the Beijing Olympics appears to have been postponed after the sport’s governing body failed to reach any concrete conclusions on the issue.

After mounting pressure, the International Olympic Committee announced today that it had asked the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) to investigate the allegations surrounding four gymnasts, including He Kexin who won gold on the uneven bars.

However despite promising a prompt resolution to the dispute which threatens to sour the final days of the Games, GIF later issued a statement which gave no timeframe for a resolution to the inquiry which is now expected to take days or even weeks.

“In response to a request from the International Olympic Committee, the FIG has now asked the Chinese Gymnastic Association to submit further documents testifying to the birthdates of the gymnasts,” the statement said.

“On receipt of these documents, the FIG will forward its conclusions to the International Olympic Committee. It is in the interests of all concerned, not least the athletes themselves, to resolve this issue once and for all.”

China has been at the centre of a storm of media allegations that three of its gold medal-winning gymnasts were underage after documents discovered on the internet appeared to show some of the girls were as young as 14.

The dispute centres on official registration documents recovered by several US media organisations from the online archives of the General Administration of Sport of China – the equivalent of the Ministry of Sport - which showed He Kexin’s date of birth as “January 1 1994”.

This contradicted the date of birth shown on her passport, which was used to prove her eligibility to compete at the Olympics where all gymnasts must be 16 or over. According to this document He was born on January 1 1992.

Sceptics also point to a news report published just nine months before the Beijing Olympics by the Chinese government’s Xinhua news agency which gave He’s age as 13. Officials have since dismissed that report, saying Xinhua had never been given her age and made a “mistake”.

China’s gymnastic coach, Lu Shanzhen, indignantly insisted that the passports and a supporting birth certificate, provided by the Chinese authorities to the Olympic authorities were sufficient proof of the He Kexin’s eligibility to compete.

"Surely it's not possible that these documents are still not sufficient proof of her birthdate? The passports were issued by the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The identity card was issued by China’s Ministry of Public Security. If these valid documents are not enough to clarify this problem, then what will you believe?," he said.

The IOC, who have striven to avoid embarrassment to their Chinese hosts at all costs during these games, also appeared to support the home nation’s claims that their gymnasts were legal.

“The information we have received seems satisfactory in terms of the correct documentation - including birth certificates,” said IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies.

However widespread suspicions still linger, particularly since neither the Chinese, the IOC nor the International Gymnastics Federation appear able to explain the discrepancy between the gymnasts’ passports and the official records.

With both the IOC and the Chinese determined to have “an incident-free Games” it is now widely expected that the results of the FIG investigation will not be known until some time after Sunday’s closing ceremony.

If He is stripped of her gold medal in the uneven bars, Britain’s Beth Tweddle, 23, stands to move up to the bronze medal position, which would be Britain’s first women’s gymnastics medal for a century.