Official accused of abusing Chinese athlete Wang Li sacked, claims found ‘basically true’
Yunnan Provincial Sports Bureau also says that further investigations into the Asian Games dragon boat champion’s allegations are under way
An official accused of verbally and physically abusing China’s triple Asian Games dragon boat gold medallist Wang Li has been dismissed, according to the provincial sports body that oversees her training.
This weekend, the Yunnan Provincial Sports Bureau announced that an investigation had found Wang’s allegations “basically true”, and added that further inquiries were under way.
The 23-year-old Wang and her teammates won gold in the women’s 200m, 500m and 1,000m races at Hangzhou, making her the first Yunnan athlete to claim three Asian Games golds in the discipline.
On December 11, Wang took to the Chinese social media platform RedNote to report that after returning to the Yunnan Songmao base, Fan demanded the 150,000 yuan (US$21,500) bonus she had received from the national team.
She claimed she faced continual “verbal abuse and corporal punishment”, and that Fan told sports authorities she was “retiring due to injury”, effectively ending her career.