Russian UFC fighter Petr Yan hits back at online abuse by Iranian novice over his Chinese roots
- Iranian MMA fighter training in Dagestan posts insulting pictures and calls Yan ‘a Chinese and a Nazi’
- Yan, who has a paternal Chinese grandfather and is a self-described ‘Russian, Orthodox Christian man’, fires back
Russian UFC star Petr Yan is in line to be challenging for the American promotion’s bantamweight title soon. But he’s had a much uglier fight to contend with back home.
Yan, whose fighting nickname is “No Mercy”, is blond and blue-eyed. He hails from the small town of Dudinka in the Siberian Arctic and describes himself as a “Russian, Orthodox Christian man”.
However, Yan’s Instagram post of a controversial Russian social activist led to him being abused online – on account of his Chinese ancestry.
Previously, Yan’s Chinese heritage and surname had not attracted much attention – Russia has almost 200 recognised ethnic groups. Yet ethnic Chinese are a rarity. Even though Russia and China share a 4,000-kilometre common border, the latest census revealed fewer than 30,000 Russian citizens with Chinese ancestry, compared to tens of millions in the Southeast Asian countries neighbouring China.
Chinese immigration into the Russian Empire peaked at the end of the 19th century and surged again during the first world war. Most arrived as labourers but many established businesses and prospered. Hundreds of thousands of Chinese were living all across Russia before the Revolution of 1917, but during Stalin’s purges most of the Soviet-Chinese were expelled to China. Many were executed on false charges of being foreign spies and agents. Yet, some managed to stay on in the Soviet Union. Nothing, however, is known about the story of Yan’s grandfather.