EURASIAN BOXING PARLIAMENT — SPORT IS OUTSIDE POLITICS
Mikhail Denisov, Eurasian Boxing Parliament President
The Eurasian Boxing Parliament is a unique sports organization of a new format which brings together more than 50 professional boxing federations all across Eurasia. Since its establishment, the EBP has sought to instigate cross-border cooperation between national federations. So, professional boxing, a non-Olympic sport, sets forth the Olympic unifying formula. The Eurasian Boxing Parliament is built upon the Olympic principle of “sport is outside politics.”This principle is reflected in the initiative of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who invited the UN General Assembly to work out and adopt a separate resolution to finally seal the principle of depoliticizing sport in international law.
The first congress of the EBP, held in Moscow on 24 October 2015, adopted a respective declaration. All 24 national delegations voted in favour: Armenia, Belarus, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Macedonia, Russia, Serbia, Montenegro, Philippines, Slovenia, South Korea, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Thailand, Türkiye, Uzbekistan and Estonia.
The adopted document, among others, declares the refusal to engage in any political technologies and activities aimed at inciting interethnic, sectarian, racial and ethnic strife, or in any kind of sanction policies, dis-crimination and double standards. Dr Federico Mayor Zaragoza, President of the Culture of Peace Foundation, filed a written request to the Congress delegates, wishing the EBP successful work and a clear horizon.
The “sport is outside politics” principle is steadily observed by the Eurasian Boxing Parliament even today. In 2016, the EBP was officially recognised by the International Boxing Federation (IBF), and over the following years was acknowledged by other leading world professional boxing organisations — WBO, WBA, WBC.
EBP Championships are held at the world’s biggest and most iconic venues and landmark places, such as Moscow’s Red Square, New York’s Madison Square Garden, Monaco, and MGM Grand Las Vegas. EBP’s honoured champions are worldwide professional boxing legends: Roy Jones Jr., Manny Pacquiao and Kostya Tszyu. In 2017, the International Boxing Federation Congress (U.S.) initiated the Silk Road Tournament, which was organised jointly by the IBF and IBF China and successfully convened in 2017—2018 with finals in Macau. The tournament was broadcast on CCTV, China’s state-run TV channel, and brought together boxers from 15 nations. The TV audience of the Silk Meeting UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, 2018 M. Pacquiao, EBP’s honourable champion Meeting the honourable EBP champion K. Tszyu Roy Jones Jr., EBP’s honourable champion S. Kovalev, the first EBP champion EBP Congress, 2015Road Tournament exceeded 110 million people.
By 2019, more than 50 professional boxing federations from Eurasian countries have become members of the Parliament. The ЕВР proved itself as an effective and sustainable peacemaking tool. Thus, on 20 November 2018, New York hosted the VIII Global Forum of the UN Alliance of Civilisations (UNAOC). As a central global platform, this event brings together political leaders and the most prominent representatives of civil society to discuss key issues of civilisational threats and strategies. The UNAOC Global Forum saw the EBP put forward an initiative to organise an “International Institute of Trust” within the United Nations. EBP’s President and the UN Secretary General had a meeting on this subject, with the latter highly praising this initiative and proposing to pursue communications under a regular direct dialogue.
On 24 August 2019, the second EBP Congress took place in Chelyabinsk, and it attracted delegations of national federations and professional boxers, including prominent athletes from more than 50 European and Asian countries. Among them were such worldclass stars as Roy Jones Jr., Kostya Tszyu, Orzubek Nazarov, Ruslan Provodnikov, Eduard Troyanovsky, Dmitry Kirillov, Anatoly Alexandrov, Dmitry Kudryashov, Sul-tan Ibragimov and Roman Karmazin. The Congress was attended by IBF President Daryl Peoples, as well as world top boxing organisations — WBC, WBO, WBA and the Russian Boxing Federation.
The Congress focused primarily on creating a healthy climate for sport and the planet. In particular, the event summed up the preliminary outcomes of the international campaign “True Boxing for the Clean Planet” organized by the Eurasian Boxing Parliament. The event included an international dendrological expedition to identify the historical algorithm of large-scale forest fires and their correlation with climatic temperature fluctuations by analysing annual tree rings in forest fire zones.
The scientific side of the expedition was provided by the Laboratory of Plant Introducion and Dendroindication, Khujand Scientific Centre, National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan, and the Institute of International Rivers and Eco-Security, Yunnan University, People’s Republic of China. So far, studies have been carried out in the Peryn Skete of the Nativity of the Theotokos standing at the point where the Volkhov River flows out of Lake Ilmen near Novgorod the Great.
The samples obtained will create a unique database for reconstructing climate chronology over 300 years. The social part of the Congress and the international campaign “True Boxing for the Clean Planet” culminated with setting up the first and only Alley of Boxing Academicians in the park of Plast city (Chelyabinsk). The event was attended by world professional boxing celebrities who planted their name trees — Siberian cedars. The EBP presents one of the most exciting and attractive sports for its audience.
Its management developed a long-term strategy of holding regular sporting and charity events across Eurasia with the participation of renowned athletes, cultural figures and representatives of regional and global media. The concept of each event is tailored to suit the specifics of the venue. Through regular sports, humanitarian and charity events in Eurasian countries, the activities of the EBP boost the importance of integration and the idea of Eurasian cooperation in the media.