Former basketball star Yao Ming yesterday invited staunch Beijing critic Enes Kanter Freedom to visit China after the Boston Celtics player urged athletes to boycott the Winter Olympics in the capital.
Kanter has emerged as one of China’s most vocal critics in the sporting world, a rare athlete willing to forgo lucrative endorsements to speak on issues such as Beijing’s treatment of its Uighur and Tibetan minorities.
He has repeatedly spoken out on social media and been a guest on Western news shows as the Olympics nears.
Photo: Reuters
In recent interviews he has accused China of using “money to buy silence” and called on other athletes “to pick morals over money.”
He also said that the diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Games by Australia, the UK and the US was “good, but not enough.”
Yao, China’s most famous basketball star and one of its Olympic bid ambassadors, was asked about Kanter’s politics at a news conference in Beijing.
“I’ve heard of him, but I can’t really judge him because I don’t know him,” the retired Houston Rockets player and current president of the China Basketball Association said. “If there is an opportunity, I would like to invite him to visit China... Then he may have a more comprehensive understanding of us.”
Chinese officials have previously invited foreign journalists and diplomats to go on state-arranged tours to Xinjiang to counter claims by human rights groups and Washington that a genocide is being carried out against Uighurs and other Turkic minorities, including through forced labor in factories and internment camps where detainees have allegedly been tortured and sexual abused.
Foreign reporters regularly encounter interference, surveillance and even detention by police and unidentified individuals while attempting to report from the ground in Xinjiang.
Kanter was raised in Turkey, where the plight of China’s Uighurs is closely followed. He is also a vocal critic of Turkey’s autocratic President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
He added “Freedom” to his name late last year when he gained US citizenship.
China suspended domestic broadcasts of NBA games for a year after Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey wrote on Twitter in support of Hong Kong democracy protesters in 2019. The country is by far the NBA’s largest overseas market.
The Women’s Tennis Association suspended all its China tournaments over concerns about the safety of China’s Peng Shuai, who disappeared from public view after she accused a former Chinese Communist Party leader of sexual assault.
She reappeared last month in pictures that showed her with Yao and other Chinese sports figures.
The association’s suspension was yesterday praised by four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka
“I’m really proud of them. I feel like it’s a situation where we need more information, which is definitely really hard,” she said.
On Saturday, world No. 3 Garbine Muguruza said that she feared the “real truth” about what happened to Peng might never be known.
“It seemed like for a moment, okay, we’re going to find out what’s happening,” she said. “I think it’s going to be very difficult to find a real truth and for her to be able to talk freely.”
TOOTHLESS: Bologna never looked like finding a way back, and Antonio Conte and his substitutes were waiting to celebrate long before the final whistle SSC Napoli on Monday lifted the Italian Supercoppa with a 2-0 win over Bologna in Riyadh, David Neres netting both goals to earn the league champions a deserved victory over the toothless Coppa Italia winners. Neres opened the scoring with a stunning strike from distance six minutes before halftime and found the net again in the 57th minute when Bologna were caught trying to play out of defense. “We came here as champions of Italy, we wanted this trophy and we showed it with a great performance,” Napoli forward Matteo Politano told Mediaset. “We could have scored a few more goals, but
Backup quarterback Luke Weaver on Wednesday night threw a 22-yard touchdown pass to Nick Cenacle with 10 seconds left, as the University of Hawaii rallied for a 35-31 comeback victory over the University of California, Berkeley in a thrilling Hawaii Bowl. Weaver entered the game after Micah Alejado took a hard hit on the previous play. With the Rainbow Warriors (9-4) in range for a tying field goal, coach Timmy Chang took a shot at the end zone, and Cenacle got between two defensive backs and made the contested catch. “How amazing is that?” Chang said. “It’s a program that is built
Fulham on Monday climbed away from the English Premier League relegation zone and left Nottingham Forest mired in the fight for survival after Raul Jimenez’s penalty sealed a 1-0 win. Marco Silva’s side started the day just two points above fourth-bottom Forest, but Jimenez’s first-half goal at Craven Cottage moved them 10 points clear of the bottom three. While Fulham’s relegation fears were eased heading into the Christmas schedule, Forest are just five points ahead of third-bottom West Ham United in the scrap to avoid crashing into the Championship. Forest had won six of their previous eight games in all competitions, with a
Barcelona wingers Raphinha and Lamine Yamal on Sunday guided the Catalan giants four points clear at the top of La Liga with a 2-0 win at 10-man Villarreal. Brazil international Raphinha won and converted an early penalty, before Villarreal’s Renato Veiga was sent off before halftime for a late lunge on teenager Yamal. The 18-year-old slotted home Barca’s second midway through the second half, as Hansi Flick’s side restored their advantage on Real Madrid and won an eighth consecutive league game. Villarreal are fourth after Atletico Madrid moved ahead of them with a comfortable 3-0 win at Girona earlier. “The attitude and mentality of
RSS