Swimming body announces new policy on gender inclusion

BUDAPEST — FINA, the international governing body for swimming and other aquatics sports, adopted a new gender inclusion policy that prohibits male-to-female transgender athletes who transitioned after beginning male puberty from competing in women’s events.

“We are faced with such a delicate balancing act,” FINA President Husain Al-Musallam said. “We have to protect the rights of all our athletes to compete, but we also have to protect competitive fairness at our events, especially women’s competition and also the past record and achievement of the women.”

Athlete Ally, a nonprofit LGBTQ athletic advocacy group, called the new policy discriminatory.

“FINA’s new eligibility criteria for transgender athletes and athletes with intersex variations is deeply discriminatory, harmful, unscientific and not in line with the 2021 International Olympic Committee framework on Fairness, Inclusion and Non-Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity and Sex Variations,” Anne Lieberman, Director of Policy and Programs at Athlete Ally, said in a statement. “The eligibility criteria for the women’s category as it is laid out in the policy police the bodies of all women, and will not be enforceable without seriously violating the privacy and human rights of any athlete looking to compete in the women’s category.”

Last November, the IOC published advice shifting the focus from individual testosterone levels and calling for evidence to prove when a performance advantage existed. The IOC encourages each sport’s international governing body to create its own policies based on its framework.

FINA also plans an “open” category for athletes to be allowed to compete at some of its major competitions “without regard to their sex, their legal