Kuwaiti sheikh no longer IOC member, says Olympic body

Kuwait’s Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Sabah, who was last year banned for 15 years from all positions within the International Olympic Committee over ethics breaches, is no longer an IOC member, the Olympic body said on Thursday.

The IOC, which had sanctioned the once-powerful Sheikh Ahmad over a court case in Switzerland, said that there had been no request for an extension of his membership, reported Reuters.

“The IOC membership of Sheikh Al-Sabah ended with the closing of the 144th IOC Session [last week] when his eight-year term concluded,” said an IOC spokesperson. IOC memberships can in some cases be extended until the age of 74.

A former OPEC secretary-general, the 61-year-old Sheikh Ahmad had been an IOC member since 1992 but in 2021 was found guilty in Switzerland of forgery and a fake arbitration procedure. The decision was upheld by the Court of Appeals of Geneva.

The sheikh was banned for three years in 2023 over his alleged involvement in the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) elections. He was head of the OCA for 30 years until 2021.

He was already self-suspended as an IOC member after being convicted by a Swiss criminal court of forgery in 2021, following which he also stepped down as president of the OCA.

Once one of the most influential people in sports politics, the Kuwaiti sheikh held key positions in both the IOC as well as world football’s governing body FIFA. He was Kuwait’s defence minister from 2023 to 2024.

A former close ally of outgoing IOC President Thomas Bach around the time that the German lawyer ran for office in 2013, Sheikh Ahmad led the Association of National Olympic Committees. He was also in charge of the IOC’s purse — Olympic Solidarity — which spends more than $650 million a year to support athletes and national Olympic committees, among others.

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