Icon: enlarge
Caster Semenya wants to start again over 800 meters (archive image)
Photo: Hendrik Schmidt / dpa
The two-time Olympic champion Caster Semenya is going to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg in her longstanding legal dispute.
Semenya announced this via Twitter.
"I hope the European Court of Justice will end the longstanding human rights violations against female athletes by World Athletics," the 30-year-old South African wrote in a statement.
"All we want is permission to run free, now and forever, as the strong and fearless women we are and always have been."
The two-time 800-meter Olympic champion suffered a defeat at the Swiss Federal Court in Lausanne in September 2020.
It had rejected her complaint with which Semenya had taken action against a decision of the International Sports Court Cas.
At the core of the legal dispute is a controversial rule of the World Athletics Federation - today World Athletics - on the testosterone limit for middle-distance runners with intersexual abilities.
"This fight is not just about me, but about taking a stand and fighting for the dignity, equality and human rights of women in sport," said the Semenya and thanked everyone "who stood behind me" .
Semenya is not allowed to start on her gold course
The rule requires that Semenya lower her natural testosterone levels through medication.
The three-time world champion refuses.
For the association she is one of the “biologically male athletes with female gender identities”.
She is therefore currently not allowed to compete in running competitions over a distance of between 400 meters and a mile, including 800 meters, the discipline in which she won Olympic gold.
The regulations are criticized, especially representatives from South Africa support Semenya's position.
Mainly because of the way in which women athletes are supposed to lower their testosterone levels: taking birth control pills every day, using hormone blocker injections or having an operation.
"The regulations require these women to undergo humiliating and invasive physical exams," Semenya's lawyers said.
This would be followed by medical procedures harmful and experimental to women.
Icon: The mirror
ptz / dpa / AP