WUSHU AND ARMENIAN-TURKISH RELATIONS
Tert.am
21:07 ~U 22.03.10
Armenia faced artificial obstacles in Turkey during the Wushu
Championship, said President of the Traditional Wushu Federation of
Armenia Tigran Chobanyan today, summing up the results of the Armenian
Wushu team in the European Wushu Championship that took place in
Antalya from March 7-13. Wushu, by the way, is a full-contact sport
derived from traditional Chinese martial arts.
"We did not have any problems with the population in Turkey. In
that sense, we were given a good welcome, while what concerns the
competition, we came to realize that Armenia was a serious target,
and that everything was being done so that the Armenian flag would
not be raised in the training grounds. Despite that, we succeeded in
winning two gold medals," said Chobanyan.
He also mentioned that the referees were supporting the Turkish
athletes as a result of which Armenia missed a few more gold medals.
"On the first day, Davit Grigoryan defeated the Turkish athlete in
the adult’s contest. On that very day, six Turkish representatives
were defeated. It seemed to us that everything was OK, but the next
day the referee staff made a U-turn in its approach and began to
allow serious mistakes," explained Chobanyan.
Armenia appealed to the European Wushu Federation in relation
to one of the matches. The Federation has acknowledged that the
referees committed serious errors and that, in fact, it was the
Armenian athlete who won (in that particular match). The Appellate
Commission had already arrived at the same conclusion; however, the
Federation’s Executive Committee decided by vote to leave result of
that match unchanged.
Chobanyan explains this contradiction by saying, "The Turks either
pressured the international Federation or gave them large sums
of money."
"What happened in Turkey must be spoken about [and condemned] through
international mass media so that no such cases ever repeat themselves,"
he said.
The Wushu World Championship is to be held in 2010 in the Turkish
city of Izmir.