THE HEAD OF the Women’s Tennis Association said he is prepared to cut lucrative business ties with China if tennis star Peng Shui remains unaccounted for and her sexual assault allegations against a top Communist Party official are not investigated.
WTA boss Steve Simon’s comments on Thursday came after Tennis great Serena Williams called for an investigation into Peng’s whereabouts.
Peng, a former Wimbledon and French Open doubles champion, alleged on Chinese social media earlier this month that former vice-premier Zhang Gaoli — who is in his seventies — had “forced” her into sex and they had an on-off relationship.
The claims, which brought the #MeToo movement into the highest echelons of China’s ruling Communist Party for the first time, were quickly scrubbed from the Twitter-like Weibo platform and the 35-year-old has not been seen since.
Simon told CNN that he is willing to lose hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Chinese business in one of the WTA’s biggest markets to ensure Peng’s safety.
“We’re definitely willing to pull our business and deal with all the complications that come with it,” Simon said.
“Women need to be respected and not censored,” he added.
Serena Williams on Thursday joined Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic in drawing attention to the case.
“I am devastated and shocked to hear about the news of my peer, Peng Shuai,” former world number one Williams wrote on Twitter.
“I hope she is safe and found as soon as possible. This must be investigated and we must not stay silent.”
Williams’ tweet was accompanied by a photo of a smiling Peng captioned with #WhereIsPengShuai.
The WTA, the top world body for women’s tennis, has called for proof that she is safe as pressure mounts on Chinese authorities to clarify Peng’s status and safety.
- Email doubts -
Beijing has repeatedly refused to comment on her fate or the case.
But the editor of the state-run Global Times, Hu Xijin, tweeted Friday that he didn’t believe that “Peng Shuai has received retaliation and repression speculated by foreign media for the thing people talked about”.
Earlier this week, state-run CGTN published a screenshot on Twitter of what it said was an email written by Peng to Simon and other WTA officials.
In the email, Peng claims that her earlier accusations are “not true” and says she is “resting at home and everything is fine”.
But doubts were quickly flagged about the awkward language used in the purported email from Peng, which Twitter users noted had a cursor visible in the screenshot posted by CGTN.
Simon said that he was struggling to believe the email was authentic.
“Whether she was coerced into writing it, someone wrote it for her, we don’t know,” Simon told CNN.
“But at this point, I don’t think there’s any validity in it and we won’t be comfortable until we have a chance to speak with her.”
Beijing has in the past faced allegations of using forced confessions on state media, with British regulators revoking CGTN’s licence for failing to comply with fairness and privacy rules.
Bernard Jackman, Gavan Casey, and Murray Kinsella reflect on Ireland’s stunning win over the All Blacks, hail Ciara Griffin’s Ireland career, and chat about Rassie:
The42 Rugby Weekly / SoundCloud
Absolutely no other option, should have been done already. China can’t be allowed to get away with this
@WiseUp: unfortunately history has shown that powerful people can and do get away with the most outrageous crimes, even murder, Jamal Khashoggi is recent prove of that. Hopefully she will be found safe and well.
@Gordon Larney: yea! And Varadkar there the other day smiling away in pics beside the dude who had that journalist chopped up.
What about all the other non famous people that regularly go missing in China for dissent or accusations against authority?
@Barry Teehan: as unfortunate as it may sound it’s probably going to take a case such as this to get the ball rolling on such investigations. Hopefully the story itself doesn’t disappear the same way.
@Peter Lewis Jnr: the ball might be rolling but it will come to a sudden stop at the Chinese border.
Let us all shout out loud “Where is Peng Shuai? ” . We cannot just dismiss the disappearance of anyone who speaks up for themselves!
He maybe not be “missing”,but where is Richard O’Halloran?
@Jonathan O’Riordan: exactly, and Simon Coveney certainly isn’t saying anything.
The Men’s tour need to step up also
What about the Head of the Human rights council dissapearing and butchering Kamal Khasogi in an embassy?
Nothing to be said about that?
@Gary C: you think nothing was said about either??? Google can dispel that assumption quickly enough.
@Gary C: Nothing was said.????
The number of people saying what about such and such is odd to me, are these other people important , yes of course they ate but if this brings attention to the atrocities committed it’s a equally important step in the right direction surely
Great bunch to make things disappear, sure when’s the last time you saw a stray cat here.
@DERRY1973: What the 80’s band?
The ATP will surely do likewise.
40 love Ccp to serve