Three-time Olympic heavyweight champion Teofilo Stevenson said on Thursday two Cuban boxers who Fidel Castro decreed would never compete for their country again after deserting their teammates during the Pan American Games deserve another chance.
"They are great figures and they should be given another opportunity," Stevenson, one of only three boxers to win three Olympic titles, said in an interview.
Cuba's Guillermo Rigondeaux has won two Olympic bantamweight titles and hopes to try for a third this summer in Beijing. But he and 2005 welterweight world champion Erislandy Lara disappeared in July during the Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro. Both were later arrested for overstaying their visas and sent back to Cuba.
Rigondeaux and Lara insist they never intended to defect, but a German promoter said they signed contracts and the German embassy in Brazil reported both had applied for visas. Castro wrote in an essay shortly after their return to Cuba that the pair "had reached the point of no return" with the national boxing team.
But Stevenson, vice president of the Cuban Boxing Federation, said it would not surprise him if both compete formally again, saying they would have to "climb back in the ring and win." He quickly added, however, that reinstatement to the national team was not up to him.
"In our country there is a system of reeducation that can be applied to those who commit an error or have flaws," he said. "The only ones you can't pardon are traitors."
Stevenson, who also won three world amateur titles and two Pan Am golds, said he did not consider Rigondeaux and Lara traitors because they expressed their desire to return to Cuba after they were arrested in Brazil. He did not clarify what he meant by re-education, but talked about prisoners and others who are "rehabilitated."
In an interview on Monday, Rigondeaux said he has continued to train and stay in shape to box for Cuba in the Olympics. But he said that no top government official has visited him since he returned to the island on Aug. 5.
Jose Ramon Fernandez, head of Cuba's Olympic Committee, said on Thursday that while boxing authorities have not allowed either fighter to return to the ring formally, both continue to draw state salaries as athletes.
He said boxing authorities were still "analyzing" their cases, but would not comment further.
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