Piers Morgan forced to delete tweet after Imane Khelif wins Olympic boxing gold

After Imane Khelif clinched an Olympic gold medal, Piers Morgan felt the need to tweet about it. However, he quickly deleted his tweet after realizing he had gotten his facts wrong.

Khelif, an Algerian boxer, has been at the center of a gender eligibility controversy at the Paris Olympics. Nevertheless, she was cheered on by thousands of Algerians at Roland Garros as she won a unanimous decision over China's reigning world champion Liu Yang in the welterweight category.

The 25-year-old dominated the three-round bout and was carried around the arena in a victory lap by her ecstatic team.

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Khelif's win comes just nine days after she defeated Italy's Angela Carini in her first-round bout in just 46 seconds, sparking global outrage. This outcry is expected to intensify following her decisive victory.

Carini's post-fight comment that she "had never been hit so hard" during her brief Olympic appearance was picked up by several public figures, including Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and JK Rowling.

Trump incorrectly stated, "It's a person that transitioned," while Musk retweeted a post by American swimmer Riley Gaines, who wrote: "Men don't belong in women's sport." Rowling, while acknowledging that Khelif is not trans, wrote: "My objection... is to male violence against women becoming an Olympic sport."

After the victory on Friday, Morgan posted: "A biological male just beat a biological male to win an Olympic gold medal in a women's boxing competition. Congrats to everyone who supported this travesty."

His comments about Khelif lacked evidence, and his assertion on the fighter was incorrect. Morgan seemed to confuse China's Liu Yang with Chinese Taipei's Lin Yu-ting, who is at the heart of the ongoing gender controversy. Lin will compete for gold Saturday in another weight class.

Morgan then retweeted a correction after removing the original post: "A biological male just won an Olympic Gold medal in a women's boxing competition. Congrats to everyone who supported this travesty."

Despite the International Boxing Associations (IBA) 2023 ban for not meeting gender eligibility criteria, both Khelif and Lin Yu-ting were approved by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

Before being sidelined following a breakthrough victory against Russian up-and-comer Azalia Amineva, Khelif had exclusively fought as a woman throughout her career. She first made waves at the 2017 World Championships and took part in the Tokyo Olympics, bowing out in the quarter-finals to Ireland's Kellie Harrington.

In the wake of clinching gold in Paris, a determined Khelif proclaimed, "I am fully qualified. I am a woman like any other woman. I was born a woman, I lived as a woman, I competed as woman - there is no doubt. There are enemies of success of course. That gives my success a special taste."

IOC's head honcho dispelled any doubts about inclusion, firmly stating: "This is not a question of inclusion, this has never played a role in all this, this is a question of justice: women must be allowed to take part in women's competitions. And the two are women.

"It is not as easy (as those) in this cultural war may want to portray it, that the XX or XY is the clear distinction between men and women. This is scientifically not true anymore. Therefore these two are women and they have the right to participate in the women's competition. This has nothing to do with inclusion in any way."

The IOC has acknowledged Khelif and Lin's adherence to entry regulations, even though the organization did away with gender verification testing at the onset of this century due to scientific counsel and its potential violation of athletes' human rights, a point underscored by Bach.

When queried if the IOC would re-evaluate gender classifications, Bach remarked, "If someone is presenting us a scientifically solid system how to identify men and women, we are the first ones to do it. We do not like this uncertainty, we do not like it for the overall situation, we would be more than pleased to look into it.

"But what is not possible is that somebody saying 'this is not a women' just by looking at somebody or falling prey to a defamation campaign by a not credible organisation with highly political interests."

In her own statements over the matter, Khelif expressed indifference to the public discourse, stating, "I don't care what anyone is saying about me with the controversy. All that is important to me is that I stay on the level and give my people the performance they deserve. I know I'm a talented person and this is a gift to all Algerians."