CONTROVERSIAL Algerian boxer Imane Khelif is now an Olympic Games gold medallist.
She defeated Chinese opponent Yang Liu in the 66kg to take the gold medal at the Paris Olympics Games.
She is expected to pocket 100,000 dollars.
Khelif received a warm reception from the crowd as she entered the ring at Roland-Garros Stadium for her fourth fight of the Games.
Algerian flags were seen waving all around the arena.
She has been subject to a torrent of online abuse, with prominent anti-trans figures, right-wing commentators and politicians incorrectly calling her a man.
Imane Khelif is at the heart of a gender row; She is said to be suffering from Differences of Sexual Disorder (DSD). DSD are a group of rare conditions involving genes, hormones and reproductive organs. Some people with DSDs are raised as female but have XY sex chromosomes and blood testosterone levels in the male range.
The controversy fueled the widening culture war around gender identity.
Italian pugilist Angela Carini had inadvertently brought world focus on Khelif after she threw in the towel in their women’s 66kg encounter in a round-of-16 bout in Paris at exactly 46 seconds into her Olympic boxing match.
Carini later said she quit because of the pain from Khelif’s opening punches, adding that her nose bled afterwards. “My face and nose were hurting,” Carini said, according to the Italian sports daily Gazzetta dello Sport. “I couldn’t breathe anymore.
Eighteen-Eleven Media