Friday, July 11, 2008

Afghanistan's only female athlete for Beijing gone missing, might be seeking asylum...

he only female athlete on Afghanistan's team for the Beijing Olympics has gone missing from a training camp in Italy and apparently is seeking political asylum in Norway.

Mehboba Ahdyar, a 19-year-old runner who competes in the 800 meters and 1,500 meters, hasn't been heard from since leaving the training center in Formia last week. Her luggage and passport also were gone.

"The IOC accepts that athletes sometimes feel they have to make hard choices to improve their lives," International Olympic Committee spokeswoman Emmanuelle Moreau said Thursday. "It would appear this is what has happened in this case."

Ahdyar, part of Afghanistan's four-member Olympic team, had been training for the Aug. 8-24 Games on an IOC scholarship program that assists athletes from smaller and less-developed nations.

She began training in April at a high-performance center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and moved in early June to the pre-Games facility in Formia, south of Rome, where she was supposed to stay until July 7.  More...

See also: Saudi women fighting for Olympic rights. Go, girls!!

And this: Olympics: free Saudi Arabia!!!!

And this: Afghan plane hijacker working as a cleaner ... at Heathrow!!!

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