Chinese government owned Global Times The paper on Tuesday blamed swimmer Zhang Yufei’s poor performance in the race for the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics on “crazy slander” and a “media war” against the athlete after her positive doping test in 2021.
Zhang Competed She won the bronze medal in the women’s 100-meter butterfly on Sunday, a race in which she lost to two Americans, gold medalist Tori Huske and silver medalist Gretchen Walsh. Zhang is still Be expected As she is also the Olympic record holder, she is scheduled to compete in the upcoming women’s 50m freestyle and 200m butterfly events.
of Global Times She said the story of her bronze medal win was a tragedy created by the “media bias” that followed her and the 22 other swimmers from China’s team. test Just before the 2021 Tokyo Summer Olympics, China’s athletics association announced that its athletes had tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine (TMZ). The Chinese athletics associations involved denied that the athletes had taken performance-enhancing drugs (TMZ is a substance commonly used to treat heart disease), and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) accepted their explanation and allowed the athletes to compete.
But the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) is not leaving the issue alone. Demanding The situation was investigated: Concerns from US athletes led Congress to hold hearings in May and the Department of Justice eventually opened a criminal investigation into the matter in July.
of Global Times be criticized With questions lingering about the athletes’ positive drug tests on Tuesday, Zhang argued they had to overcome “intense Western scrutiny, insane slander, rigorous and excessive doping testing, and the fact that the US Department of Justice has opened a criminal investigation into an alleged sports doping scandal involving nearly 20 top Chinese swimmers.”
“Facing immense pressure and vicious attacks from the Western media, the young woman endured the stress to win the bronze medal,” Propaganda reported. “She kept a warm smile on her face for the cameras throughout. It was only as she passed the Chinese crowd that her eyes began to sparkle with tears.”
Although the man himself did not mention the doping scandal, Global Times “We cannot ignore the underlying factors that affect athletes’ performance – media pressure, the inequitable frequency of testing, and the high rate of exemptions for certain drugs in the United States,” he added.
of Times The United States, which is not hosting or running the Paris Olympics in any capacity, is weaponizing “relentless and unethical testing” of Chinese athletes because cheating is part of a “rules-based liberal international order dominated by the United States,” the paper argued. The state-run paper did not clarify how testing athletes who test positive for banned substances more frequently than those who do not serves U.S. geopolitical goals. Nor did it mention the fact that France hosts the Olympics along with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which has historically defended China against accusations of human rights abuses and a long list of other scandals.
The swimming article doesn’t mention France, Global Times Earlier this week he seized the opportunity to disparage French culture, blaming French “easygoing” for a series of Olympic mistakes, including organisers confusing North and South Korea and misidentifying an Argentine swimmer as Chinese.
But commentary on Zhang’s defeat focused on accusing the United States of promoting “ruthless and unethical testing” of athletes.
of Global Times The article also reported that one of the Chinese government-approved “experts” said that the drug tests “disrupted the Chinese swimming team’s pre-competition training and brought embarrassment to the Olympics.” The article did not provide any information that would clarify how the “expert,” Professor Shen Yi of Fudan University, knew this fact. Fudan University list Shen is a professor of international politics and is in no way an expert on competitive swimming or athletics in general.
The Chinese state media outlet blasted the US as a political entity, but failed to address the fact that US athletes have been vocal in their calls for investigations into the positive tests among Chinese athletes, and Olympians have repeatedly testified before Congress about their concerns.
“Now people are being allowed to do anything. How is that possible?” said Michael Phelps, the most decorated swimmer in Olympic history. Said “I don’t understand. I [who believes] If anyone tests positive, I want them to be banned for life.”
Phelps Appeared It was submitted to Congress again in late June, accusing WADA of “deep-rooted systemic problems that have repeatedly and negatively impacted the integrity of international sport and athletes’ rights to compete fairly.”
U.S. Olympic swimmer Katie Ledecky 7 times Gold Medalist, Expressed At a press conference just before the Olympics began, athletes voiced their concerns, asking, “We hope that everyone here this week comes in clean, but what really matters is, did they train clean?”
The IOC and WADA issued a joint statement on July 24, just before the Olympics began, denying any wrongdoing, particularly with regard to the treatment of Chinese athletes. WADA president Witold Banka asserted that “WADA has not demonstrated any bias, undue interference or other wrongdoing in assessing the China Anti-Doping Agency’s decision not to file anti-doping rule violations.”
“WADA’s decision not to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport was inarguably reasonable based on the evidence,” Banka said. ClaimedIt cited the conclusions of an “independent prosecutor” appointed by WADA to investigate the matter.
At the time of writing, the United States Take the lead At the Paris Olympics, Japan led the world medal tally with 28 medals, but China led the gold medal tally with 16, 8 to Japan’s.
