Amnesty International slams French hijab sports ban ahead of Olympics

Amnesty International slams French hijab sports ban ahead of Olympics
France is the only European country to enforce a ban on headscarves in sport. Above, a hijab shop on April 11, 2011 in Paris. (AFP file photo)
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Updated 16 July 2024
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Amnesty International slams French hijab sports ban ahead of Olympics

Amnesty International slams French hijab sports ban ahead of Olympics
  • Human rights group accuses host country of breaching international law
  • Amnesty criticizes International Olympic Committee for failing to challenge ban

LONDON: Amnesty International has accused France of breaking international human rights law by enforcing a ban on women competing at this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris wearing headscarves.

In a report on the ban published on Tuesday, Amnesty also accused the International Olympic Committee of weakness by not challenging France’s “discriminatory” law.

Anna Blus, Amnesty’s women’s rights researcher in Europe, said: “Banning French athletes from competing with sports hijabs at the Olympic and Paralympic Games makes a mockery of claims that Paris 2024 is the first ‘Gender Equal Olympics’ and lays bare the racist gender discrimination that underpins access to sport in France.”

She added: “Discriminatory rules policing what women wear are a violation of Muslim women’s and girls’ human rights and have a devastating impact on their participation in sport, blocking efforts to make sports more inclusive and more accessible.”

The report details how bans on wearing headscarves in multiple sports in France, justified domestically on grounds of secularism but which is not accepted in international law, have created a situation where the Olympic host is in breach of the IOC’s own human rights rules as well as numerous human rights obligations and treaties to which France is a party.

The IOC has failed to call on France to overturn bans on headscarves at the Olympics and in other sports, claiming in a letter earlier this year that French law was outside the committee’s remit, and that “freedom of religion is interpreted in many different ways by different states.”

France is the only European country to enforce a ban on headscarves in sport, which also contradicts the rules of international sports bodies such as FIFA, the International Basketball Federation and the International Volleyball Federation.

Basketball player Helene Ba told Amnesty that the French ban “is a clear violation of the Olympic charter, values and provisions, and an infringement on our fundamental rights and freedoms … I think it’s going to be a shameful moment for France.”

She added: “Mentally it is also hard because you really feel excluded … especially if you go to the bench and the referee tells you to go to the ladders (stands). Everyone sees you … It’s a walk of shame.”

Another female athlete told Amnesty anonymously: “It is sad. It’s even shameful to be at this point in 2024, to block dreams just because of a piece of fabric.”

In a press release, Amnesty said: “For several years, French authorities have been weaponizing these concepts (of secularism) to justify the enactment of laws and policies that disproportionately impact Muslim women and girls.

“And all of this is occurring against a backdrop relentless, twenty-year campaign of harmful lawmaking and regulation of Muslim women’s and girls’ clothing in France, fueled by prejudice, racism and gendered Islamophobia.”

Foune Diawara, co-president of the football collective Hijabeuses, told Amnesty: “Our fight is not political or religious but centered on our human right to participate in sports.”

Blus said: “No policymaker should dictate what a woman can or cannot wear and no woman should be forced to choose between the sport she loves and her faith, cultural identity, or beliefs.

“It is not too late for the French authorities, sports federations and the IOC to do the right thing and to overturn all bans on athletes wearing the hijab in French sport, both at the summer Olympics and in all sport, at all levels.”


Jabal Tuwaiq lift trophy at Jazan region’s 1st Junior Hockey Championship

Jabal Tuwaiq lift trophy at Jazan region’s 1st Junior Hockey Championship
Updated 30 April 2025
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Jabal Tuwaiq lift trophy at Jazan region’s 1st Junior Hockey Championship

Jabal Tuwaiq lift trophy at Jazan region’s 1st Junior Hockey Championship
  • The tournament, organized by the Saudi Hockey Federation, featured four teams who scored a total of 23 goals in six matches
  • The Eagles of Abu Arish took 2nd place, and Al-Majd 3rd; Al-Majd’s Haitham Musalami was named player of the tournament

JAZAN: Jabal Tuwaiq were crowned champions of the first Junior Boys’ Hockey Championship held in Saudi Arabia’s Jazan region, which concluded on Wednesday at Saad bin Muadh School.
The tournament, organized by the Saudi Hockey Federation, featured four teams who scored a total of 23 goals in six matches. The Eagles of Abu Arish took second place, with Al-Majd finishing third.
In the individual honors, Al-Majd’s Haitham Musalami was named player of the tournament, the top scorer award went to Eagles player Abdullah Azeek, and Jabal Tuwaiq’s Suleiman Al-Muaydi was named best goalkeeper.
The hockey federation said the tournament represented a foundational step in efforts to foster and develop competitive youth hockey across the region, in line with the organization’s strategic vision to expand the sport nationwide and lay the groundwork for national Junior Hockey League.


Chelsea FC teams up with UAE’s DAMAC for branded residences deal in Dubai

Amira Sajwani, Managing Director of Sales and Development of DAMAC Properties is pictured with Jason Gannon.
Amira Sajwani, Managing Director of Sales and Development of DAMAC Properties is pictured with Jason Gannon.
Updated 30 April 2025
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Chelsea FC teams up with UAE’s DAMAC for branded residences deal in Dubai

Amira Sajwani, Managing Director of Sales and Development of DAMAC Properties is pictured with Jason Gannon.
  • Agreement includes what is said to be first-of-its-kind football-themed property-development collaboration: Chelsea Residences by DAMAC
  • The luxury real estate company will also feature as front-of-shirt sponsor of the men’s and women’s teams for remainder of the season

DUBAI: Chelsea Football Club on Wednesday announced a long-term global partnership agreement with UAE-based DAMAC Properties, a Middle Eastern luxury real estate company.

The collaboration includes an ultra-modern development in Dubai, Chelsea Residences by DAMAC, described as a first-of-its-kind football-themed branded residences project. It will be built with the team’s famous brand woven into its fabric, the partners said, from its concierge services to high-performance spaces designed reflect the club in terms of high-end style, commitment to excellence and its vision for the future.

To showcase the partnership and celebrate the launch of the first Chelsea-branded residences, DAMAC will feature as front-of-shirt sponsors of the men’s and women’s teams for the remainder of this season, beginning with the men’s UEFA Conference League semi-final against Swedish side Djurgarden on May 1.

“This launch marks the first of an elite collection that celebrates not just the passion of Chelsea F.C. but its enduring legacy, innovative spirit and relentless pursuit of excellence,” said Amira Sajwani, DAMAC’s managing director of sales and development.

“This initiative goes beyond celebrating the beautiful game; it sets a new benchmark for those who expect nothing less than the exceptional, every time.”

Jason Gannon, Chelsea’s president and chief operating officer, said: “DAMAC are world renowned in building luxury properties, and we are thrilled to be working with the industry leader to bring to market a first-of-its-kind branded Chelsea F.C. residence in Dubai.

“With the club located in the heart of London, the collaboration will bring Chelsea to life in Dubai, supporting our continued growth on the global stage. We can’t wait to see Chelsea Residences take its place in the Dubai skyline.”

The project will be part of Dubai’s new beachfront development Maritime City and consist of more than 1,400 residential units. Each will offer seafront views and access to exclusive Chelsea-branded amenities with a focus on health, fitness and well-being, the partners said.


Sinner considered walking away from tennis during doping controversy

Sinner considered walking away from tennis during doping controversy
Updated 30 April 2025
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Sinner considered walking away from tennis during doping controversy

Sinner considered walking away from tennis during doping controversy
  • Sinner accepted a three-month ban in February after a settlement with the World Anti-Doping Agency
  • “I didn’t feel comfortable and then I said, maybe after Australia, a little bit of free time, in the sense where I take a little break it will do me good,” he said

ROME: World number one Jannik Sinner, who is about to return to action after a three-month doping ban, thought about walking away from tennis even while successfully defending his Australian Open title, but is coming back with a new mentality.
Sinner accepted a three-month ban in February after a settlement with the World Anti-Doping Agency, who had appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport against an independent tribunal’s decision in August to clear him.
The Italian had tested positive for anabolic agent clostebol which Sinner said entered his system from a member of his support team through massages and sports therapy.
Sinner won the Australian Open in January, with the WADA case hanging over him, and was asked during an interview with Italian broadcaster RAI on Tuesday whether he had ever considered giving up tennis.
“Yes, yes. I remember before the Australian Open this year, I was not in a very happy moment because there was still that case of doping,” Sinner said.
“I didn’t feel really comfortable in the locker room, where I ate. It was a bit like some players looked at me differently and I didn’t like it at all. And there I said it’s heavy to live tennis in this way.
“I didn’t feel comfortable and then I said, maybe after Australia, a little bit of free time, in the sense where I take a little break it will do me good.”
Sinner was then forced into a break by the ban, but is now back in training for the upcoming Italian Open next month.
“Slowly, I’m getting back into the rhythm of real training with a goal in front of me,” Sinner said.
“Sometimes it goes very well, sometimes there is a drop and I don’t know why, so I will certainly be very happy to return to the court.
“Especially in Rome, it is a special tournament for me, but I certainly enter with a slightly different mentality. I miss the competition. I am certainly very happy that this phase is now over and we are ready to start again.”
Sinner’s settlement brought plenty of criticism from both current and former players, with Serena Williams saying she would have been banned for 20 years and had her Grand Slam titles taken away had she tested positive in a similar fashion.
“I mean, I don’t even want to answer. Everyone is free to say what they want, everyone can judge, but that’s okay,” Sinner said.
“It’s important to me that I know how that happened, but above all also of what I went through and it was very difficult.
“I don’t wish it on anyone to really pass as innocent something like that because it wasn’t easy, but we are in a world where everyone can say what they want, so it’s okay.”


How a fighter pilot’s mental techniques helped tiny Bodø/Glimt reach the Europa League semifinals

How a fighter pilot’s mental techniques helped tiny Bodø/Glimt reach the Europa League semifinals
Updated 30 April 2025
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How a fighter pilot’s mental techniques helped tiny Bodø/Glimt reach the Europa League semifinals

How a fighter pilot’s mental techniques helped tiny Bodø/Glimt reach the Europa League semifinals
  • Bodø/Glimt have also had some big results in Europe in recent seasons — a 6-1 thrashing of Jose Mourinho’s Roma in the Conference League 2021 stands out
  • “It is a fairy tale, almost a miracle,” Mannsverk told AP

OSLO: How did an unheralded Norwegian team from a tiny town north of the Arctic Circle become one of the fairytale stories of European soccer?
For Bodø/Glimt, the transformation has been underpinned by a fighter pilot who developed mental techniques for his squadron before bombing missions in Libya.
Bjørn Mannsverk discovered a group of players exuding negative energy and prone to “a collective mental breakdown” when he was asked in early 2017 to join the backroom staff of a team that had just been relegated to Norway’s second tier.
His task as “mental coach” at Bodø/Glimt? To make players talk openly about their feelings, lower stress levels, change their attitudes and routines about things like preparation and nutrition, and remove the stigma around mental training.
Winning or losing no longer mattered. It was all about following a philosophy and culture established by Mannsverk, a former Royal Norwegian air force squadron leader whose military duties took him to Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks and to Libya for a NATO-led intervention in 2011.


The results have been extraordinary.
After securing an immediate return to Norway’s top division, the team — based more than 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) north of Oslo in a fishing town, Bodø, with a population of around 55,000 — have captured four of the country’s last five league titles. It started in 2020 with a first in the history of a club founded in 1916.
Bodø/Glimt have also had some big results in Europe in recent seasons — a 6-1 thrashing of Jose Mourinho’s Roma in the Conference League 2021 stands out — and this year they have become the first Norwegian club to reach the semifinals of a major European competition.
The first leg against Tottenham in the Europa League takes place in London on Thursday. It’s Bodø/Glimt’s biggest ever match.
“It is a fairy tale, almost a miracle,” Mannsverk told AP in a video interview. “How can you actually come from (Norway’s) second division in 2017 to playing a Champions League playoff and teams like Arsenal five years later?
“But I think it’s possible ... if you have the right mentality and you work hard over time.”
An active air force pilot for more than 20 years, Mannsverk and others in his squadron were the subjects of a mental training project in 2010 where the focus was on meditation and “every day repeating boring stuff, but with 100 percent attention.”
It meant that when he was in Libya the following year, he had the mental capacity to handle the dangerous missions he was asked to perform. His squadron’s mantra — “train as you intend to fight” — worked.
“Even though I got strong feelings when my first bombs hit the target and it was in infernal flames and fragments and everything,” he said, “it was like, ‘My training said that it’s OK, this is happening, recognize that, but know I have to return and do my job.’”
With Bodø until recently having a NATO air base, it was simply a happy coincidence that Bodø/Glimt’s leadership came across members of the squadron at the same time as they were seeking a “silver bullet” — as Mannsverk put it — to improve the team’s mental conditioning.
A project was born and fully embraced by manager Kjetil Knutsen following his appointment in 2018.
Bodø/Glimt have never looked back.
Mannsverk’s fingerprints are all over the team’s behavior, though he acknowledges there has been such a buy-in by the players that they now take decisions by themselves.
Like having a rotating cast of eight captains to share leadership duties. Like when the players gather into a circle — Mannsverk calls it the “Bodø/Glimt Ring” — after conceding a goal to discuss what happened and maintain solidarity. Like the players having no specific targets, apart from being the best version of themselves.
Inge Henning Andersen, Bodø/Glimt’s chairman, told the AP that midfielder Ulrik Saltnes considered retiring because he used to suffer from stress-related stomach issues that flared up around matches. Saltnes opened up about his problems to Mannsverk and “finally found a way out of it,” Andersen said.
The team play at an intensity that far exceeds its rivals, which players attribute to Mannsverk.
“I don’t think it would be possible to play like that without Bjørn and the mental work we do,” Saltnes once told the BBC.
This season’s Europa League campaign is giving Bodø/Glimt widespread attention, notably for its location. The team’s Aspmyra stadium — with a capacity of less than 9,000 — is one of the most northernly in world soccer at 67 degrees latitude. Tourists have long come to the town on the tip of Norway’s west coast because it is a good spot to see the northern lights.
Bodø, named the European Capital of Culture in 2024, has less than an hour of sunlight during its shortest days, meaning players take supplements to combat a lack of sunlight. It can be bitterly cold and windy in the long winters, making for tough trips for opponents from other countries.
On paper, Tottenham, one of the world’s richest clubs, start as a huge favorite against Bodø/Glimt. The crowd at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Thursday will be bigger than Bodø’s population.
Yet the English club are having one of their worst seasons in a generation and currently lies in 16th place in the 20-team Premier League. It gives Bodø/Glimt a realistic shot at an upset, like they produced when getting past Italian team Lazio in the quarterfinals.
Another chance, then, for the club to write another amazing chapter in their remarkable journey.
“We like to tell our story,” Mannsverk said. “The philosophy is a good thing. We know it’s difficult in football, where there’s so much money involved, to give a coach or a team the time. And it takes time to change and drill in the mentality.
“This was not done overnight ... but I’m totally convinced that it will work more or less all over.”


Saudi Esports Federation, PUBG MOBILE unite to forge new era for Kingdom’s esports scene

Champion of PUBG MOBILE National Championship KSA will be sent to $3m PUBG MOBILE World Cup. supplied
Champion of PUBG MOBILE National Championship KSA will be sent to $3m PUBG MOBILE World Cup. supplied
Updated 30 April 2025
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Saudi Esports Federation, PUBG MOBILE unite to forge new era for Kingdom’s esports scene

Champion of PUBG MOBILE National Championship KSA will be sent to $3m PUBG MOBILE World Cup. supplied
  • Partnership creates unprecedented opportunities for Saudi players, fueling record participation
  • Champion of PUBG MOBILE National Championship KSA will be sent to $3m PUBG MOBILE World Cup

Riyadh: The Saudi Esports Federation, the national body of esports in the Kingdom, and PUBG MOBILE, one of the world’s most popular mobile games, announced the signing of a landmark memorandum of understanding, marking a pivotal moment in the development of the Kingdom’s esports ecosystem.

The strategic alliance aligns PUBG MOBILE’s local community with the SEF’s national esports development objectives, and is expected to create unprecedented opportunities for Saudi players.

It integrates the PUBG MOBILE National Championship into the SEF’s Saudi eLeague, making it the main PUBG MOBILE competition within the national circuit. This alignment strengthens the SEF’s grassroots-to-pro structure and embeds PMNC as a core component of Saudi Arabia’s official esports calendar.

The MoU has already yielded record-breaking results, further streamlining the pathway from amateur to professional for aspiring Saudi players.

In addition to PMNC’s role, the partnership encompasses broader development through the SEF Academy and university leagues — ensuring a structured and sustainable talent pipeline for PUBG MOBILE players in Saudi Arabia.

And as a direct consequence of the collaboration, the champion of PMNC KSA, held within SEL, will now earn a coveted spot to compete at the prestigious PUBG MOBILE World Cup, held as part of the Esports World Cup later this year.

The PMWC boasts a staggering $3 million prize pool, solidifying its position as one of the most sought-after global PUBG MOBILE tournaments, with the opportunity representing a monumental step for Saudi players by offering them a chance to showcase their skills on the world stage and to compete for a life-changing prize.

“Through strategic collaborations with leading titles such as PUBG MOBILE, we are expanding opportunities for our players, building sustainable pathways to international competition, and accelerating the development of a dynamic and thriving esports ecosystem,” said Prince Faisal Bin Bandar, president of the federation.

“We are proud to see Saudi talent rise to the global stage and look forward to inspiring future generations to pursue esports excellence,” he added.

Vincent Wang, head of PUBG MOBILE Publishing, Tencent Games, said that PUBG MOBILE “is deeply committed to fostering the growth of esports in Saudi Arabia, and this MoU with the Saudi Esports Federation is a testament to that commitment.

“We are thrilled to provide the Kingdom’s players a clear pathway to the global stage, starting with the PMNC KSA champion’s journey to the PUBG MOBILE World Cup. We believe this partnership will unlock the immense potential of Saudi esports and inspire a new generation of champions,” he added.

The impact of the partnership is already clear, with PMNC KSA witnessing record-breaking player registrations, surpassing all previous PUBG MOBILE tournaments in the Kingdom.

“By embedding PUBG MOBILE into our structured leagues and talent development programs, we are enabling players to compete at a professional standard from an early stage,” said Meshal Al-Qabbani, executive director of esports at the Saudi Esports Federation. “We look forward to witnessing a new wave of Saudi talent rise through the ranks and achieve international success through this historic collaboration.”

The surge in players highlights the growing enthusiasm for PUBG MOBILE esports in Saudi Arabia, as well as the strength of the collaboration between PUBG MOBILE and the SEF.

The MoU announcement coincides with the culmination of PMNC KSA, where the champion will be crowned, awarded $26,000 and have their ticket to the PMWC metaphorically punched.