Iran’s one and only female Olympic medalist said she has defected over the Iranian government’s “corruption and lies.”
Kimia Alizadeh, 21, posted on Instagram on Saturday announcing that she had defected from Iran and permanently left the country for Europe. She slammed the Iranian regime for oppressing women and for largely dictating her own life.
“Let me start with a greeting, a farewell or condolences,” Alizadeh said, according to a CNN translation. “I am one of the millions of oppressed women in Iran who they have been playing with for years.”
She attacked the regime for controlling her life and using her as a tool to bring prestige to the regime.
“They took me wherever they wanted. I wore whatever they said. Every sentence they ordered me to say, I repeated. Whenever they saw fit, they exploited me,” she said, adding that Iranian leaders took credit for her accomplishments.
“I wasn’t important to them. None of us mattered to them, we were tools,” Alizadeh added.
Alizadeh made clear in the post that while she had defected from the control of Iran’s government, she still supported its people.
“I remain a daughter of Iran wherever I am,” she said.
She did not identify which country she had defected to but said she “didn’t want to sit at the table of hypocrisy, lies, injustice and flattery” or participate in the government’s “corruption and lies.” Some Iranians, however, suggested she had left for the Netherlands.
“My troubled spirit does not fit with your dirty economic ties and tight political lobbies. I wish for nothing else than for Taekwondo, safety and for a happy and healthy life,” Alizadeh said.
Alizadeh became the first female medalist from Iran during the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She won the bronze medal for Taekwondo in the women’s -57 kg. weight class.
Alizadeh defected as thousands of Iranians have started protesting against the regime for shooting down a passenger airliner, killing all 176 people on board. On Friday, Iran admitted to accidentally shooting down the passenger jet while firing ballistic missiles as two U.S.-Iraqi military bases in Iraq. The missile attack on U.S. assets was meant as retaliation for a Jan. 2 U.S. drone strike that killed Iran’s top military commander, Qassem Soleimani.
