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Caster Semenya wins appeal at European Court of Human Rights
Double Olympic 800m champion Caster Semenya was discriminated against by rules which forced her to lower her testosterone levels in order to continue competing, the European Court of Human Rights has found.
The 32-year-old South African was born with differences of sexual development (DSD) and is not allowed to compete in events between 400m and a mile without taking testosterone-reducing drugs.
On Thursday the ECHR ruled in favour of Semenya in a case involving testosterone levels in female athletes.
Semenya, a three-time 800m world champion and 800m and 1500m Commonwealth champion, has been in a long-running dispute with governing body World Athletics since regulations requiring her to have hormone treatment were introduced in 2018.
She has twice failed in legal battles to overturn the decision. The case at the ECHR was against the government of Switzerland for not protecting Semenya’s rights and dates back to a Swiss Supreme Court ruling three years ago. In the lengthy judgement published on Tuesday, the ECHR found the Swiss government did not protect Semenya from being discriminated against when its Supreme Court refused to overturn a decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) which upheld World Athletics rules governing the participation of athletes with DSD.
The decision, made by a panel of seven people at the ECHR, was split 4-3 in favour of Semenya. World Athletics described the ECHR chamber as “deeply divided”.
In a statement, it said: “We remain of the view that the DSD regulations are a necessary, reasonable and proportionate means of protecting fair competition in the female category as the Court of Arbitration for Sport and Swiss Federal Tribunal both found, after a detailed and expert assessment of the evidence. “The case was filed against the state of Switzerland, rather than World Athletics. We will liaise with the Swiss government on the next steps and, given the strong dissenting views in the decision, we will be encouraging them to seek referral of the case to the ECHR Grand Chamber for a final and definitive decision.
“In the meantime, the current DSD regulations, approved by World Athletics Council in March 2023, will remain in place.”
(BBC)