Iran imposed a lifetime ban on their weightlifter on Wednesday, August 30 after the athlete shook hands and greeted an Israeli counterpart at the World Master Weightlifting Championships 2023 in Poland, while an Iranian flag was wrapped around him.
Veteran weightlifter Mostafa Rajaei, 40, shook hands and posed for photographs with Israeli weightlifter, Maksim Svirsky on Saturday, August 26 after the two shared a podium post their win.
The Iran Weightlifting Federation banned Rajaei from all sports for life, calling the incident an “unforgivable” infraction.
The federation announced the dissolution of a committee established to represent veteran weightlifters as well as the removal of Hamid Salehinia, the team’s head of weightlifting, from his position.
The head of the federation, Sajad Anoushiravani issued a statement saying, “In addition to apologising to the revolution’s commander, the families of martyrs, and all Iranians, I pledge we will unquestionably never experience occurrences like this in the weightlifting family.”
The weightlifting championships in Krakow drew more than 1,000 athletes from 47 different nations, according to the organisers.
Iran strongly restricts any interaction between Iranian and Israeli athletes and does not recognise Israel as a nation.
The Iranian athletes have often refused to face Israeli competitors many times and have been disqualified from tournaments or have bowed out of competitions on medical grounds.
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