Imane Khleif threatens lawsuit over report, swings back at world leaders 'who speak without a source'
Olympic gold medalist Imane Khelif threatened a lawsuit against a French journalist over last week’s report which alleged the controversial boxer had testicles.
Khelif appeared on Italy’s "Lo Stato delle Cose" on Thursday and touched on the report.
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"We will meet with the French journalist in court," the Algerian athlete said, via NDTV.
The report from Le Correspondent cited a French-Algerian medical report and claimed Khelif was impacted by a sex development disorder that is only found in biological males. The report said that without a proper medical examination, the wrong gender is assigned at birth.
It was Khelif’s first remarks about the report since its release. Fox News Digital reached out to Khelif’s lawyers but did not hear back.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) told Fox News Digital it understood that Khelif was preparing a lawsuit against the journalist.
"We understand that Imane Khelif has taken legal action against individuals who commented on her situation during the Olympic Games Paris 2024, and is also preparing a lawsuit in response to the latest reporting," the IOC said. "The IOC will not comment while legal action is ongoing, or on media reports about unverified documents whose origin cannot be confirmed."
The International Boxing Association President Umar Kremlev also responded to the report.
"Everyone already knows the news. The International Olympic Committee has violated all sports rules by putting a man against a woman. Tests have again confirmed that Imane Khelif is indeed a man," Kremlev said last week. "Today, as the President of the International Boxing Association, which upholds gender equality and protects both women’s and men’s boxing, I demand that Thomas Bach and his team both verbally and in writing, apologize to the global boxing community.
"Thomas Bach himself bears direct responsibility for this, as he personally lobbied for this to happen – for men to compete against women. On behalf of all boxers in the world, I demand them to kneel and apologize to the boxing community and to those girls who have been beaten and abused. Thomas Bach, I am now waiting, as is everyone in IBA, for your official apology."
Khelif was embroiled in controversy before and throughout the Paris Olympics after reports surfaced over a failed gender test that led to a disqualification at the International Boxing Association World Championships. The Algerian Olympic Committee said at the time that Khelif was disqualified for "medical reasons."
The issue was a dark cloud over the women’s boxing portion of the Olympics, as Khelif faced accusations of being a man competing in the women’s division. Khelif pushed back on all accusations about gender.
President-elect Donald Trump and Italian Giorgi Meloni both remarked about the Khelif controversy.
"I have seen that there are many politicians and presidents who speak without a source, and it is something strange, because they make statements without a basis, without reality," Khelif said, via The Telegraph.
Khelif has already filed lawsuits against multiple people who called the boxer a man, including "Harry Potter" author J. K. Rowling.
Fox News' Ryan Canfield contributed to this report.
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