IBA appeals to Swiss federal court after CAS ruling on Olympics

LONDON: The International Boxing Association (IBA) has appealed to the Swiss Federal Tribunal after a Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruling against the world body’s bid to regain Olympic recognition.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided a year ago to strip the IBA of recognition over its failure to complete reforms on governance, finance and ethical issues. The CAS rejected an appeal in April.

Rival body World Boxing is seeking IOC recognition to replace the IBA and keep the troubled sport on the programme for the 2028 Los Angeles Games after the Paris Olympics starting this month.

IBA, which is led by Russian Umar Kremlev, said in a statement on Tuesday that it had appealed to the Swiss court, which would now investigate whether the CAS decision was unlawful.

The CAS is sport’s highest court.

“We felt that CAS violated our right to be heard, we felt that they didn’t properly analyse all the issues and the arguments that we put forward, so we appealed to the court,” said IBA General Secretary and CEO Chris Roberts.

The boxing tournaments at the Paris Games are being organised by the IOC but the Olympic body has said it cannot continue doing that. While the IOC regularly removes or adds sports to the Olympic Games programme, it is extremely rare for the Olympic body to strip an international sports federation’s recognition.