A Man Han Quan Xi, or Complete Manchu-Han Banquet, made completely of exquisitely carved jades was displayed in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province.
Fish head with diced chili peppers, braised pork, steamed lobsters to dumplings made of stones, all household dishes in China, were tantalizing enough to stimulate the appetite of visitors. Sculpture master Zou Wantong spent more than a decade to create this set of carved artwork.
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A Man Han Quan Xi, or Complete Manchu-Han Banquet, made completely of exquisitely carved jades was displayed in Kunming, southwest China's Yunnan Province.
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
(Photo/China Daily)
SYDNEY (AP) — Two newspapers reported that 23 Chinese swimmers were cleared to compete at the Tokyo Olympics despite testing positive for a banned heart medication because world governing bodies agreed with Chinese authorities and ruled that the tests had been contaminated.
The Daily Telegraph in Sydney and the New York Times said Saturday that the swimmers tested positive for the heart medication trimetazidine at a training camp held months before the start of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.
Chinese anti-doping authorities found the results of the tests were Adverse Analytical Findings (AAF) but cleared the swimmers without any penalties after finding that the samples were flagged as positive as a result of contamination.
The 30-member Chinese swim team won six medals in Tokyo, including three golds. Many of the athletes still compete for China and are expected to swim at the Paris Olympics this summer.
The World Anti-Doping Agency responded to what it called “some misleading and potentially defamatory media coverage this week” and explained the process it undertook upon learning about the positive tests.
“Ultimately, we concluded that there was no concrete basis to challenge the asserted contamination,” WADA's senior director of science and medicine Olivier Rabin said.
WADA said it had been given a tip by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency as early as 2020 — before this case arose — about allegations of doping cover-ups in China but that USADA never followed up with evidence.
USADA CEO Travis Tygart called the news of the Chinese positive tests “crushing.”
“It’s even more devastating to learn the World Anti-Doping Agency and the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency secretly, until now, swept these positives under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world,” Tygart said.
World Aquatics, which oversees global swimming, told the Daily Telegraph it was confident “that these AAFs were handled diligently and professionally, and in accordance with all applicable anti-doping regulations, including the World Anti-Doping Code.”
The drug at the center of this case was also the medication that led to the suspension of Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva at the Winter Olympics in Beijing in 2022.
In that case, WADA moved quickly to sanction Valieva upon learning about her positive test.
The case underscores what many view as a flaw in the global anti-doping system — that a country's own anti-doping organization is often the first line of defense in catching drug cheats and those organizations have different levels of motivation to fulfill that role.
AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports
FILE - A Chinese flag is unfurled on the podium of a swimming event final at the 2020 Summer Olympics, on July 29, 2021, in Tokyo, Japan. An Australian newspaper said Saturday, April 20, 2024, 23 Chinese swimmers were cleared to compete at the Tokyo Olympics despite testing positive to doping because world governing bodies agreed with Chinese authorities and ruled that the tests had been contaminated.(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel, File)
