12 September,2009 07:14 AM IST | | AFP
Says South Africa's sports minister IF Caster Semenyau00a0is barred from running by IAAF
South Africa's sports minister said yesterday that there will be a "third world war" if Caster Semenya is barred from competing, after a media report that the gold medallist is a hermaphrodite. "I think it would be the third World War. We will go to the highest levels in contesting such a decision," sports minister Makhenkesi Stofile told a media conference in Pretoria, saying such a move would be "totally unfair".u00a0 Stofile was reacting to a Sydney Daily Telegraph report, citing an unnamed source involved in tests on the world 800-metre champion, which said Semenya had both male and female sex organs and no womb or ovaries.
South Africa's government will carry out its own tests on Semenya before the world athletics' governing body IAAF makes a decision in November on the 18-year-old's case, reported the Sapa news agency. "We can't wait for November," Stofile said.
The teenager, who grew up in a rural north-east South Africa village, was meant to run a four-kilometre race at the national cross-country championships in Pretoria today but had pulled out, her coach said.
