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      Kylie McKenzie Speaks Out Against a Former U.S.T.A. Coach

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      PHOENIX — Kylie McKenzie, once one of America’s most promising junior tennis players, is for now back where she began, hitting balls on a local court, often with her father, living at home while trying to rescue what once seemed like a can’t-miss future.There is little doubt where that future went astray. In 2018, McKenzie, then 19, was working closely with a top coach at the United States Tennis Association’s national training center in Orlando, Fla.Anibal Aranda liked to take her to the remote courts of the tennis center, where, she said, he praised her and put his hands on her body during their workouts, pressing against her while she practiced her serve.Maybe, McKenzie thought, it was because Aranda had grown up in Paraguay and was less aware of the kind of physical contact considered appropriate in the United States. For six years, Aranda had coached for the U.S.T.A., which had been supporting McKenzie’s career and practically raising her at its academies since she was 12. Its officials trusted him, and she trusted them, and so she trusted him, too.On Nov. 9, 2018, Aranda sat so close to her on a bench after practice that their legs touched, and then he put his hand between her thighs, she said. She later learned she was not the only person to accuse him of sexual misconduct.During the last week, Aranda has not responded to repeated phone calls and text messages seeking comment, sent to a mobile number associated with his name. Howard Jacobs, the lawyer who represented him during an investigation by the U.S. Center for SafeSport, which investigates reports of abuse in American sports, said Aranda was no longer a client of his.In his testimony during the SafeSport investigation, Aranda denied ever touching McKenzie inappropriately, either during or after training. He suggested McKenzie had fabricated a story because she had been told that the U.S.T.A. was planning to stop supporting her. Accusing him of abuse, Aranda said, would make it more difficult for the organization to cut her off, an assertion U.S.T.A. coaches and McKenzie rejected.The SafeSport records are confidential, but The New York Times has reviewed a copy of the final ruling, the investigator’s report, and notes from her interviews with a dozen witnesses, including Aranda. The Times has also reviewed a copy of the police report by an Orlando detective.“I want to be clear, I never touched her vagina,” Aranda told a SafeSport investigator, according to those records. “I never touched her inappropriately. All these things she’s saying are twisted.”The incident, which McKenzie quickly reported to friends, relatives, U.S.T.A. officials and law enforcement, led to a cascade of events over the next three years. The U.S.T.A. suspended and then fired Aranda. A lengthy investigation by SafeSport found it “more likely than not” that Aranda had assaulted McKenzie. Police took a statement from McKenzie, stated there was probable cause for a charge of battery, then turned the evidence over to the state attorney’s office, which ultimately opted not to pursue a case. McKenzie said she began to experience panic attacks and depression, which have hampered her attempts to reclaim her tennis prowess.Anibal Aranda, left, with Jose Caballero, a coach, and the tennis player CiCi Bellis, who is a friend of Kylie McKenzie’s, in 2017.John Raoux/Associated PressBut what especially troubles McKenzie, now 23, is something that she only learned reading the confidential SafeSport investigative report on her case. An employee at the U.S.T.A had a similar experience with Aranda about five years earlier, but chose to keep the information to herself.The U.S.T.A. was unaware of that incident because the employee said she did not tell anyone until she was interviewed by the SafeSport investigator for McKenzie’s case.“To know he had a history, that almost doubled the trauma,” McKenzie said last week at a coffee shop not far from her home. “I trusted them,” she said of the U.S.T.A. “I always saw them as guardians. I thought it was a safe place.”McKenzie’s case highlights what some in tennis have long viewed as systemic problems with how young players, especially women, become professionals. Players often leave home at a young age for training academies, where they often work closely with male coaches who serve as mentors, surrogate parents and guardians on trips to tournaments.Chris Widmaier, a spokesman for the U.S.T.A., said any suggestion that its academies are unsafe was inaccurate. He said the organization’s safety measures include employee background checks, training on harassment and how predators target and make potential victims vulnerable to advances, as well as multiple ways to report inappropriate or abusive conduct.“More than three years ago, an incident was reported by Ms. McKenzie and that report was treated with absolute seriousness and urgency,” Widmaier said in a statement. “The U.S.T.A. immediately, without any hesitation or delay, notified the U.S. Center for SafeSport and cooperated in a full and thorough investigation of the incident. The U.S.T.A. suspended the offending party on the day of the report and has not permitted him back on property or at any U.S.T.A.-sponsored function or event since. In addition to promptly reporting this incident, the U.S.T.A. worked with Ms. McKenzie and her representatives to ensure that she felt safe while she continued to train and advance her tennis career. The U.S.T.A. supported Ms. McKenzie before, during and after the incident.”Widmaier said the organization was working to increase the number of female coaches. It has added women to its staff at its national training centers — there are now five women, six men and three open positions on its national coaching staff — and developed a coaching fellowship program in which women must account for half the enrollment.McKenzie has repeated her account of the events on multiple occasions, to friends, U.S.T.A. officials and law enforcement. In finding McKenzie’s account credible, SafeSport investigators wrote that her account had remained consistent and was supported by contemporary evidence, including text messages and U.S.T.A. records.In 2019, SafeSport suspended Aranda, 38, from coaching for two years and placed him on probation for an additional two years. Aranda is one of 77 people involved with tennis on the U.S.T.A.’s suspended or ineligible list because they have been convicted or accused of sexual or physical abuse.‘You’re a champion. I want to work with you.’McKenzie at an international hardcourt juniors championship tournament in College Park, Md., in 2015.Cal Sport Media via AP ImagesMcKenzie started playing tennis at 4 when her father, Mark, put a racket in her hands. By fourth grade she was being home-schooled so she could practice more.When she was 12, coaches with the U.S.T.A., who had seen her at tournaments and camps, offered her an opportunity to train full time at its development academy in Carson, Calif. She moved with the family of another elite junior player from Arizona, leaving her parents and two younger siblings behind.Within a few years she was homesick and burned out. Coaches kept her on the court for hours after training to talk about life and tennis, and one yelled at her while they attended a tournament at Indian Wells when he found out she had kissed a boy at 14.McKenzie left Carson in 2014 and returned to Arizona. But after she won two top-level junior tournaments, officials with the U.S.T.A. persuaded her to move to the training center in Florida.A shoulder injury eventually sent her back to Arizona for 18 months, but in 2018 she returned to Florida, moving in with relatives on Merritt Island. She occasionally spent the night at the home of her friend, CiCi Bellis, then a top American prospect. Bellis was injured at the time, allowing her coach, Anibal Aranda, to work with other players.McKenzie was initially flattered by Aranda’s attention and praise. “He told me: ‘You’re a champion. I want to work with you,’” McKenzie said of Aranda. “I had every reason to trust him.”One U.S.T.A. employee would have said otherwise.During the SafeSport investigation into McKenzie’s incident, the employee, who is not being identified to protect her privacy, told the investigator that a few years earlier, Aranda had groped her and rubbed her vagina on a dance floor at a New York club during a night out with colleagues during the U.S. Open. The employee said that she left the club immediately but that Aranda followed her and tried to get in a taxi alone with her, which she resisted.After the U.S.T.A. employee learned about McKenzie’s accusations, she regretted not reporting her allegations, she told the investigator.Aranda denied touching the woman inappropriately. He told the investigator he remembered the night at the dance club but did not recall details of the evening.What follows is the story that McKenzie told U.S.T.A. officials, a SafeSport investigator, police, and shared with The New York Times last week.By October 2018, McKenzie was training almost exclusively with Aranda, alone with him for several hours every day. Initially, their hitting sessions took place on the busier hardcourts, but he soon moved them to clay courts that got little foot traffic, telling her that the slower surface would improve her footwork. He scheduled training for 11 a.m., though most players practiced earlier to avoid the midday heat.The U.S.T.A. National Campus Collegiate Center in Orlando, where McKenzie trained with Aranda.Matt Marriott/NCAA Photos via Getty ImagesEach day, she said, Aranda increased his physical contact with her. Pats of encouragement moved down her back until he was grazing the top of her buttocks. He brushed against her as they walked to the courts, making casual contact with her breasts.He used her phone to film her practice session, then inched closer to her as they sat on a bench watching the video until their legs touched. Sometimes, she said, he held the back of her hand as she held her phone and intertwined his arm with hers. Then he began resting his arm on her thigh as they talked. Sometimes he would say, “You’re too skinny,” and grab her stomach and rub her sides and waist. He would ask her how her shoulder felt and massage it, she told the investigator.Under the guise of showing McKenzie correct body position and technique, he pushed the front of his body against her back and placed his hands on her hips as she served, moving them to her underwear. Another time, he knelt and held her hips from the front, his face inches from her groin. She dreaded practicing her serve.He also made her repeat daily affirmations. Some were about tennis, but others were not. “He’d say, ‘Say you’re beautiful because you are,’” McKenzie said.Aranda told the investigator he used affirmations in training but only those focused on tennis. He acknowledged touching McKenzie’s hands, feet and hips to teach proper body position but denied holding her from behind or touching her groin.All she wanted was a tennis coach.McKenzie in Anthem, Ariz., where she practices now.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesOn Nov. 9, 2018, McKenzie felt uneasy as she walked to the court for her late-morning training session, certain Aranda wanted to practice serving. He did, she said, grinding against her harder than ever as she practiced her service motion.At the end of practice he asked her if she thought she was pretty. She was wearing leggings and had placed a towel on her lap. Aranda rested his hand on her right upper thigh. Suddenly, she felt it between her legs, “rubbing her upper labia,” according to the report.McKenzie elbowed him away. Aranda then knelt in front of her, and started aggressively massaging her calves and knees. He asked her what she wanted him to be. She told him she just wanted him to coach her and provide mental training, an answer that appeared to agitate him.“Oh, that’s it?” he said, she told the investigator.As they left the court, she said, Aranda asked her to walk to a shed to store the tennis balls. She walked with him but did not enter the shed. A few minutes later, sitting on another bench, he spoke to her about finding an agent and sponsors. He tried to hug her as she hunched on the bench. She did not hug him back, and left.McKenzie went to Bellis’s home and, shaking and crying, told her what happened. They called Bellis’s mother, who urged them to report the incident to the U.S.T.A. Bellis and McKenzie called Jessica Battaglia, then the senior manager of player development for the organization. Bellis helped McKenzie, who struggled to speak, retell the story.Battaglia immediately contacted senior officials with the U.S.T.A., including Malmqvist and Martin Blackman, the general manager of player development, and female employees who needed to be notified, according to her testimony in the report. U.S.T.A. officials informed Aranda that a report had been made and that he would no longer be allowed at the training center.Ola Malmqvist, then the director of coaching for the U.S.T.A., told the SafeSport investigator that shortly after being suspended, a distraught Aranda called Malmqvist and said: “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I made a mistake.” Then, Malmqvist said, Aranda added, “It wasn’t bad,” and also, “But I made a mistake.” Malmqvist also said Aranda “made some comment along the lines of, ‘I got too close to her.’” Aranda later told investigators that he did not recall making those statements.Later on the day of the alleged assault, Aranda texted McKenzie to ask whether she had done her fitness workout and also added her on Snapchat. (She supplied the investigator with screen shots of her phone.) When she did not respond to his messages or pick up his phone calls, he started calling Bellis. The friends went to a hotel that night so Aranda would not know where to find McKenzie.McKenzie gave a sworn statement to the police in Orlando on Nov. 29. The detective wrote in his report that probable cause existed for a charge of battery. But prosecutors wrote to McKenzie in February 2020 to say they did not believe there was enough evidence to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt.As the SafeSport investigation unfolded during the first months of 2019, McKenzie continued to train at the center with other coaches. She had persistent stomach ailments and panic attacks, she said, that hampered her breathing when she tried to practice. On many days, she just wanted to sleep. Her love for the game never wavered, though.McKenzie practicing with her father, Mark.Adriana Zehbrauskas for The New York TimesShe left the center in 2020, when the pandemic forced the U.S.T.A. to cut back. Since then, she has trained with coaches in South Carolina and Arizona. At the moment, she is playing on her own and working out several hours a day at a gym. Sometimes she goes for runs with her mother. She has worked with a therapist and would like to again, but treatment can be expensive, so she is trying to “plow through” on her own, she said.She completed high school in 2020, at age 21, and is considering attending college, possibly close to home, and maybe reviving her career through N.C.A.A. tennis but while gaining an education, a path several top women have taken, including Danielle Collins, who reached the Australian Open final in January, and Jennifer Brady, who did so in 2021 and used to hit with McKenzie on the U.S.T.A.’s courts. As a junior, McKenzie beat Sofia Kenin, the 2020 Australian Open champion.She often thinks of the U.S.T.A. employee with her own story about Aranda.McKenzie, who is soft-spoken and reserved, said she was motivated to speak out because she knows too well what can happen when women don’t.“That probably just empowered him,” she said of the silence that followed the incident at the New York club. “He felt like he was permitted to act the way he did.” More

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      Manchester United Drops Mason Greenwood After Abuse Charge

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      A woman accused the young English forward of assaulting her in a post on Instagram. The team said he would not play or train “until further notice.”Manchester United said it had suspended its young forward Mason Greenwood and would bar him from playing matches or even training with his teammates after he was accused by a woman on Sunday of assaulting her. The woman made the claim in a post on her personal social media account that included images, video and an audio recording.United issued the first of two statements about Greenwood shortly after the woman’s post became a trending topic on social media. In its statement, the club said it was aware of the allegations against Greenwood but would not comment further until the facts had been established.A few hours later, and after the woman’s claims were removed from her account, the club issued a second statement in which it announced that it was temporarily sidelining Greenwood, a 20-year-old graduate of United’s academy and one of the brightest young English talents in the Premier League, the world’s richest domestic soccer league.“Mason Greenwood will not return to training or play matches until further notice,” the team said.On Sunday evening, the Greater Manchester Police announced that they had been made aware of “online social media images and videos posted by a woman reporting incidents of physical violence,” a description that closely mirrored the public accusations against Greenwood and the swirl of publicity they had caused earlier in the day.The police confirmed that “a man in his 20s has since been arrested on suspicion of rape and assault” and that he remained in custody for questioning. In keeping with British police protocol, it did not name the man who was arrested.The images accusing Greenwood of assault were posted on Instagram on Sunday morning but disappeared, along with the rest of the images on the woman’s account, soon afterward. British and online news media outlets reported on Sunday that the police had visited Greenwood’s home on Sunday.Greenwood, a forward who started his first match for United as a 17-year-old and made his debut for England’s national team a month before his 20th birthday last fall, has been a mainstay on United’s team despite its faltering season, becoming a regular starter ahead of a group of more experienced forwards on the club’s roster. Last week, United announced that Anthony Martial, a French forward, and one of the players displaced by the emergence of Greenwood, had been loaned to Sevilla in Spain for the rest of the season.Greenwood made no public comments on the allegations on Sunday. Nike, one of his personal sponsors, said in a statement that it was “deeply concerned by the disturbing allegations and will continue to closely monitor the situation.” More

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      Peng Shuai, Chinese Tennis Player, Denies Sexual Assault Claim

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      Peng Shuai said in an interview with a Singaporean newspaper that she had been misunderstood. She also said, “I’ve been very free all along.”Peng Shuai, the Chinese tennis star whose account of sexual coercion by a former Communist Party leader ignited weeks of tensions and galvanized calls for boycotts of the Winter Olympics in Beijing, has reversed her assertion that she had been sexually assaulted by the official.Ms. Peng made the comments in an interview that was published on Sunday by a Singaporean newspaper. But the retraction appeared unlikely to extinguish concerns about her well-being and suspicions that she had been the target of well-honed pressure techniques and a propaganda campaign by Chinese officials.The controversy erupted last month when Ms. Peng wrote in a post on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform, that she had maintained a yearslong, on-and-off relationship with Zhang Gaoli, now 75, a retired Chinese vice premier. She said that in an encounter with him about three years ago, she had “never consented” and that she was “crying all the time.”She then abruptly dropped from public view, and global concern for her whereabouts grew. In a written statement later, she appeared to seek to pull back the accusation, and the Women’s Tennis Association and other professional players rallied to her side, saying they believed that her statement had been written under official duress.The tennis association suspended playing matches in China while seeking to establish independent contact with Ms. Peng. Last week, the leaders of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee criticized China’s handling of Ms. Peng’s case.In the interview with Lianhe Zaobao, a Chinese-language Singaporean newspaper, Ms. Peng, 35, said, “First, I want to stress a very important point — I never said or wrote that anyone sexually assaulted me.”“There may have been misunderstandings by everyone,” she said of her initial post on Weibo.Ms. Peng also denied that she had been under house arrest or that she had been forced to make any statements against her will.“Why would someone keep watch over me?” she said. “I’ve been very free all along.”Her denial drew skepticism from human rights advocates, who have said that Chinese officials appear to have corralled her into rehearsed video appearances.Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, said on Twitter that Ms. Peng’s latest statement was “only deepening concerns about the pressure to which the Chinese government is subjecting her.”Last month, video clips of her at a Beijing restaurant were posted on the Twitter account of the chief editor of The Global Times, an influential newspaper run by the Communist Party. The editor described them as showing Ms. Peng having dinner with her coach and friends. She also appeared in live video calls with the president of the International Olympic Committee and other officials with the organization.The Chinese authorities are likely to seize on Ms. Peng’s latest statement, recorded on video, to push back against calls for a full investigation of her claims and to oppose the tennis association’s suspension of matches in China.The minutes-long interview with Ms. Peng, which took place at a skiing competition in Shanghai, left many key questions unasked and unanswered.She was not asked directly about her relationship with Mr. Zhang, who was a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, the Communist Party’s highest body. Nor was she asked how her understanding of sexual assault squared with her earlier description of what had happened with Mr. Zhang.Understand the Disappearance of Peng ShuaiCard 1 of 5Where is Peng Shuai? More

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      Peng Shuai’s Accusation Pierced the Privileged Citadel of Chinese Politics

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      Zhang Gaoli was best known as a low-key technocrat. Then a Chinese tennis star’s allegations made him a symbol of a system that bristles against scrutiny.Before Zhang Gaoli was engulfed in accusations that he had sexually assaulted a tennis champion, he seemed to embody the qualities that the Chinese Communist Party prizes in officials: austere, disciplined, and impeccably loyal to the leader of the day.He had climbed steadily from running an oil refinery to a succession of leadership posts along China’s fast-growing coast, avoiding the scandals and controversy that felled other, flashily ambitious politicians. He became known, if for anything, for his monotone impersonality. On entering China’s top leadership, he invited people to search for anything amiss in his behavior. “Stern, low-key, taciturn,” summed up one of the few profiles of him in the Chinese media. His interests, Xinhua news agency said, included books, chess and tennis.Now the allegation from Peng Shuai, the professional tennis player, has cast Mr. Zhang’s private life under a blaze of international attention, making him a symbol of a political system that prizes secrecy and control over open accountability. The allegation raises questions about how far Chinese officials carry their declared ideals of clean-living integrity into their heavily guarded homes.“Zhang epitomized the image of the bland apparatchik that the party has worked hard to cultivate,” said Jude Blanchette, a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.Ms. Peng’s account — that Mr. Zhang coerced her into sex during a yearslong, on-off relationship — has not been corroborated. The Chinese authorities’ vigorous efforts to stifle any mention of the matter suggest there is little chance that Mr. Zhang will ever be called to public account, even if that might clear his name. Neither Ms. Peng nor Mr. Zhang have made any public comment since her post appeared.“One would have to imagine, sadly, that in an opaque and patriarchal system of unchecked power these sorts of abuses are not uncommon,” Mr. Blanchette added.China’s Peng Shuai serves against Canada’s Eugenie Bouchard during their women’s singles match at the Australian Open in 2019.Jewel Samad/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhen Ms. Peng, 35, posted her accusation on the popular social media platform Weibo on the night of Nov. 2, she took readers into the cosseted personal lives of the Communist Party’s elite. In Ms. Peng’s post, addressed to Mr. Zhang, she said the two had met more than a decade earlier when her career was taking off and his was nearing its peak. At the time, she wrote, he was the Communist Party chief of Tianjin, a northern port city, and he told her his political position made it impossible for him to divorce his wife.Mr. Zhang dropped contact with her, the post said, after ascending to the Communist Party’s highest body, the Politburo Standing Committee, a post he held for five years. During this time, he was entrusted with overseeing China’s initial preparations for the 2022 Winter Olympics, which is now being overshadowed by the furor.About three years ago, after stepping down, Mr. Zhang called the head of a tennis academy to summon Ms. Peng to play tennis with him at a party-owned hotel in Beijing, called the Kangming, that plays host to retired officials, according to her post. Later that day, she said, he forced her to have sex in his home. They resumed a relationship, but he insisted it remain furtive. She had to switch cars to be able to enter the government compound where he lives in Beijing, she wrote. He warned her to tell no one, not even her mother. With rarely a word or hair out of place, Mr. Zhang has seemed an unlikely protagonist for a scandal that has rippled around the world. He belongs to a generation of officials who rose after the upheavals of the Cultural Revolution, taking on the self-effacing ethos of collective leadership under Hu Jintao, who preceded the country’s current leader, Xi Jinping.Zhang Gaoli, right, then secretary of the Tianjin Communist Party, meeting with Lien Chan, former chairman of Taiwan’s Nationalist Party, during a business forum in Tianjin in 2008. Andy Wong/Associated PressMr. Zhang, who turned 75 the day before Ms. Peng’s post appeared, was born in a fishing village in Fujian Province. According to official accounts, his father died when he was a child. He began studying economics at Xiamen University in Fujian, but his education was cut short by the Cultural Revolution, when Mao Zedong largely shut down university classes.In 1970, he was assigned to work at oil fields in southern China, where he first heaved bags of cement, according to official profiles.Within years, he climbed into management. As Deng Xiaoping and other leaders shepherded China into an era of market reforms, Mr. Zhang became one of those officials whose economic expertise and smattering of higher education marked them for promotion. He perfected the methodical, button-down manner of a cadre who had submerged his life in the party hierarchy.In this handout photo, members of the Politburo Standing Committee, including Zhang Gaoli, far left, attend a meeting of the Communist Party’s Central Committee in Beijing in 2016.Li Xueren/Xinhua, via Associated PressHe served as the party leader of Shenzhen, the city next to Hong Kong that Deng promoted as a showpiece of China’s newfound commercial dynamism. He won the favor of Deng’s successor, Jiang Zemin, and by the early 2000s was put in charge of Shandong, a province crowded with ports and factories.In 2007, he was promoted to oversee Tianjin, the provincial-level port whose fortunes had flagged while other coastal areas boomed. Mr. Zhang pushed plans to convert a drab industrial area of Tianjin into a modern business precinct — a “new Manhattan” — that would attract multinationals and wealthy residents. That project has faltered under debt and inflated expectations, but Mr. Zhang moved upward into the central leadership in 2012. He became executive vice premier: in effect, China’s deputy prime minister.Understand the Disappearance of Peng ShuaiCard 1 of 5Where is Peng Shuai? More

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      Why Peng Shuai Frustrates China's Propaganda Machine

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      Accustomed to forcing messages on audiences at home and abroad, its propaganda machine hasn’t learned how to craft a narrative that stands up to scrutiny.The Chinese government has become extremely effective in controlling what the country’s 1.4 billion people think and talk about.But influencing the rest of the world is a different matter, as Peng Shuai has aptly demonstrated.Chinese state media and its journalists have offered one piece of evidence after another to prove the star Chinese tennis player was safe and sound despite her public accusation of sexual assault against a powerful former vice premier.One Beijing-controlled outlet claimed it obtained an email she wrote in which she denied the accusations. Another offered up a video of Ms. Peng at a dinner, in which she and her companions rather conspicuously discussed the date to prove that it was recorded this past weekend.The international outcry grew only louder. Instead of persuading the world, China’s ham-handed response has become a textbook example of its inability to communicate with an audience that it can’t control through censorship and coercion.The ruling Communist Party communicates through one-way, top-down messaging. It seems to have a hard time understanding that persuasive narratives must be backed by facts and verified by credible, independent sources. In its official comments, China’s foreign ministry has mostly dodged questions about Ms. Peng, claiming first to be unaware of the matter, then that the topic fell outside its purview. On Tuesday, Zhao Lijian, a spokesman, leaned on a familiar tactic: questioning the motives behind the coverage of Ms. Peng’s allegations. “I hope certain people will stop malicious hype, not to mention to politicize it,” he told reporters.China has grown more sophisticated in recent years at using the power of the internet to advance a more positive, less critical narrative — an effort that appears to work from time to time. But at its heart, China’s propaganda machine still believes the best way to make problems disappear is to shout down the other side. It can also threaten to close off access to its vast market and booming economy to silence companies and governments that don’t buy their line.“Messages like these are meant as a demonstration of power: ‘We are telling you that she is fine, and who are you to say otherwise?’” Mareike Ohlberg, a fellow at the German Marshall Fund, a Berlin research institute, wrote on Twitter. “It’s not meant to convince people but to intimidate and demonstrate the power of the state.”Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, has tightened limits on relatively independent media outlets and critical online voices.Greg Baker/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesChina has a history of less-than-believable testimonials. A jailed prominent lawyer denounced her son on state television for fleeing the country. A Hong Kong bookstore manager who was detained for selling books about the private lives of Chinese leaders said after his release that he had to make a dozen recorded confessions before his captors were satisfied.This time, the world of women’s tennis isn’t playing along and has suggested it will stop holding events in China until it is sure Ms. Peng is truly free of government control. The biggest names in tennis — Serena Williams, Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic, among many others — don’t seem to be afraid to lose access to a potential market of 1.4 billion tennis fans either. The pushback is problematic because the Winter Olympics in Beijing are just weeks away from opening.The country’s huge army of propagandists has failed its top leader Xi Jinping’s expectations that it take control of the global narrative about China. But it shouldn’t take all the blame: The failure is ingrained in the controlling nature of China’s authoritarian system.“It can make Peng Shuai play any role, including putting up a show of being free,” Pin Ho, a New York-based media businessman, wrote on Twitter.For Chinese officials in charge of crisis management, he continued, such control is routine. “But for the free world,” he said, “this is even more frightening than forced confessions.”One of the biggest giveaways that Ms. Peng isn’t free to speak her mind is that her name remains censored on the Chinese internet.“As long as coverages about her inside and outside China are different, she’s not speaking freely,” said Rose Luqiu, an assistant professor of journalism at the Hong Kong Baptist University.Ms. Peng appeared in a live video call with the president of the International Olympic Committee and other officials within the organization. But women’s tennis officials still have their doubts.Greg Martin/IOC, Agence France-Presse, via Getty ImagesDespite the outpouring of concern about Ms. Peng’s well-being on Twitter and other online platforms that are blocked in China, the Chinese public has little knowledge of the discussions.Late Friday night, as the momentum of the hashtag #whereispengshuai was building on Twitter, I couldn’t find any discussion of the question on Chinese social media. Still, Ms. Peng had clearly caught the attention of politically observant Chinese. I messaged a friend in Beijing who was usually on top of hot topics and asked generally, in coded words, if she had heard about a huge campaign to find someone. “PS?” the friend guessed, using Ms. Peng’s initials.It’s hard to estimate how many Chinese people learned about Ms. Peng’s allegation, which she detailed in a post on Chinese social media earlier this month. Her post — which named Zhang Gaoli, a former top Communist Party leader, as her assailant — was deleted within minutes. One Weibo social media user asked in a comment whether saving a screenshot of Ms. Peng’s post was incriminating. Another Weibo user, in a comment, described being too scared to share the post.They have good reasons to be afraid. Beijing has made it easier to detain or charge people for what they say online. Many people get their social media accounts deleted for simply sharing content that the censors deemed inappropriate, including #MeToo-related content.Ms. Peng accused Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier and top Communist Party leader, of sexual assault in a social media post.How Hwee Young/European Pressphoto AgencyChina has been bitter about its poor image in the Western mainstream news media and has talked for years about taking control of the narrative. Mr. Xi, the top leader, said that he hoped the country would have the capacity to shape a global narrative that’s compatible with its rising status in the world. “Tell the China story well,” he instructed. “Create a credible, lovable and respectable image of China.”Official media has raised the suggestion that Covid-19 emerged from a lab in the United States and spread the unproven allegation on Facebook and Twitter. China released thousands of videos on YouTube and other Western platforms in which Uyghurs said they were “very free” and “very happy” while the Communist Party was carrying out repressive policies against them and other Muslim ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region.In reality, China is less respected, and its narratives less credible, since Mr. Xi took power nine years ago. He cracked down on relatively independent media outlets and eliminated critical online voices within the country. He unleashed diplomats and nationalistic youth who would roar back any hint of criticism or belittlement.“There are three things that are inevitable in life: life, death and humiliating China,” a reader commented on a recent column of mine.Despite China’s relatively fast economic growth and relatively competent response to the pandemic, the country’s deteriorating human rights records and its uncompromising international stance are not helping its image. The negative views of China in the vast majority of the world’s advanced economies reached a historic high last year, according to Pew Research Center.China can’t respond to the questions about Ms. Peng effectively because it can’t even address the problem directly. The subject of Ms. Peng’s sexual assault allegation, Mr. Zhang, had been one of the Communist Party’s most powerful officials before he retired. The party sees criticism of a top leader as a direct attack on the whole organization, so it won’t repeat her allegation. As a result, the state media journalists who are trying to argue that Ms. Peng is fine can’t even refer to it directly.“I don’t believe Ms. Peng has received retaliation and repression speculated by foreign media for the thing people talked about,” Hu Xijin, editor of the Global Times.Giulia Marchi for The New York TimesFor Hu Xijin, the editor of the nationalist Global Times tabloid, the allegation against Mr. Zhang has become “the thing.” “I don’t believe Peng Shuai has received retaliation and repression speculated by foreign media for the thing people talked about,” he wrote on Twitter.Mr. Zhang can’t even be discussed online in China. Those who do call him “kimchi” because his given name sounds like the name of an ancient Korean dynasty.If Mr. Hu, China’s spin master, could speak more plainly, and if the Chinese people had the freedom to discuss Ms. Peng and her allegation, official media might understand how to build a narrative. Instead, Mr. Hu alternates between trying to change the conversation and trying to shut it down completely.“For those who truly care about safety of Peng Shuai, her appearances of these days are enough to relieve them or eliminate most of their worries,” he wrote. “But for those aiming to attack China’s system and boycott the Beijing Winter Olympics, facts, no matter how many, don’t work for them.” More

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      Video of Peng Shuai With Olympic Officials Fuels a Showdown With Tennis

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      The Chinese tennis star held a 30-minute video call with the leader of the International Olympic Committee, but the head of women’s professional tennis remained unable to reach her.Peng Shuai, the Chinese tennis star who disappeared from public life for more than a week after she accused a former top government official of sexual assault, appeared in a live video call with the president of the International Olympic Committee and other officials with the organization on Sunday. The video assuaged some concerns about Peng’s immediate well-being. However, it fell short of what tennis officials, who still have not been able to establish independent contact with Peng, have been demanding since the Chinese government began attempting to censor any discussion of Peng’s allegations and her largely disappearing after posting them on one of China’s main social media outlets earlier this month, creating a standoff between two of the world’s leading sports organizations.Peng, 35, a three-time Olympian, had been missing since Nov. 2, when she used social media to accuse Zhang Gaoli, 75, a former vice premier of China, of sexually assaulting her at his home three years ago. She also described having had an on-and-off consensual relationship with Zhang.According to the I.O.C., Peng, held a 30-minute call with Thomas Bach, the organization’s president and a former Olympic fencer. In a statement posted on the I.O.C. website that accompanied a photo of the call, the organization said Peng stated “that she is safe and well, living at her home in Beijing, but would like to have her privacy respected at this time. That is why she prefers to spend her time with friends and family right now.”A friend of Peng’s assisted her with her English, according to an Olympic official, though Peng became proficient in the language over her 15-year professional tennis career.Emma Terho, who chairs the I.O.C. athletes’ commission and participated in the call, said she was relieved to see that Peng appeared to be safe. “She appeared to be relaxed,” Terho said. “I offered her our support and to stay in touch at any time of her convenience, which she obviously appreciated.” Peng Shuai in action during a first-round match at the Australian Open in 2020.Kim Hong-Ji/ReutersPeng’s disappearance following the allegations placed the I.O.C. under a microscope. Beijing is the host of the Olympic Winter Games in February, and officials and top sports figures had demanded the I.O.C. pressure the Chinese government to guarantee her safety and her ability to speak openly about the sexual assault allegation. The I.O.C. is facing substantial criticism for holding the Games in Beijing amid China’s crackdowns on dissent from prominent cultural and business figures like Jack Ma, founder of the internet firm Alibaba, its suppression of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong and Tibet, and its treatment of Muslim minorities — deemed genocide by the United States and lawmakers in several nations.According to the I.O.C. statement, Bach invited Peng to a dinner when he arrives for the Games in Beijing, which would include Terho and Li Lingwei, an I.O.C. member and Chinese Tennis Federation official who also participated in the call.However, the seemingly friendly banter and dinner plans did little to satisfy Steve Simon, the chief executive of the WTA Tour. Simon has been trying to establish independent contact with Peng for more than a week to no avail and has grown increasingly strident in his criticism of the Chinese government as its government-controlled media entities released a series of photos and videos of her. In a statement on Sunday following the release of the I.O.C. video, a spokesperson for the WTA and Simon said, “It was good to see Peng Shuai in recent videos, but they don’t alleviate or address the WTA’s concern about her well-being and ability to communicate without censorship or coercion. This video does not change our call for a full, fair and transparent investigation, without censorship, into her allegation of sexual assault, which is the issue that gave rise to our initial concern.”While several top sports officials have spoken out on Peng’s behalf, and asked the “Where is Peng Shuai” question that has gone viral in recent weeks, only Simon has made it clear that his organization will not hold any tournaments in China if the government does not grant her permission to move freely, speak openly about the assault allegations and investigate the incident. The move could cost women’s pro tennis hundreds of millions of dollars of investment from China, but in a letter to China’s ambassador to the U.S. on Friday, Simon reiterated the organization’s position. He said the WTA would not be able to continue to hold its nine events in China, including the prestigious Tour Finals, scheduled to take place in Shenzhen through 2028, if he could not guarantee the safety of tennis players in the country. The men’s pro tour has also demanded assurance of Peng’s safety but has not threatened to stop holding tournaments in China, which has widely been viewed as a major growth market for all sports but presents significant moral hazards for anyone conducting business with an increasingly authoritarian government. “Money trumps everything,” said Martina Navratilova, the former champion and tennis commentator, who defected to the United States when she was 18 years old to escape communist rule in Czechoslovakia. Navratilova is one of several leading tennis figures and government leaders to speak out on Peng’s behalf. As the chorus grew louder last week, Chinese media outlets began releasing snippets of Peng to try to convince a skeptical public that she was OK.A screen grab from a video posted on a state media Twitter account supposedly shows Peng Shuai signing tennis balls at a kids’ tennis tournament in Beijing on Sunday.Via Twitter @Qingqingparis/Via ReutersVideo clips of her at a Beijing restaurant were posted on the Twitter account of Hu Xijin, the chief editor of The Global Times, an influential Communist Party newspaper, who described them as showing Peng having dinner with her coach and friends on Saturday.Hu posted another video hours later, describing it as the opening ceremony of a teen tennis match final in Beijing on Sunday to which Peng “showed up,” and then yet another of her signing tennis balls and posing for photos with children.On Friday, a journalist for another Chinese media entity released pictures said to be of Peng in what appeared to be a bedroom, surrounded by stuffed animals. In those photos, Peng appeared younger than she did in more recent images of her and there was nothing to verify when they had been taken.Those posts followed China’s state-owned broadcaster releasing a message that was supposedly from her.“Hello everyone this is Peng Shuai,” it read. It called the accusation of sexual assault, which was made just weeks ago, untrue. “I’m not missing, nor am I unsafe,” the message said. “I’ve been resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me.”The message was widely believed to have been written by someone other than Peng. More

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      Who, and Where, Is Chinese Tennis Star Peng Shuai?

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      A blackout within China on discussion of the tennis star’s #MeToo allegations has not been able to silence a global chorus of concern for her safety.A simple question has gripped the sports world and drawn the attention of the White House, United Nations and others:Where is Peng Shuai?The Chinese tennis star disappeared from public view for weeks this month after she accused a top Chinese leader of sexual assault, prompting a global chorus of concern for her safety. Then, this weekend, the editor of a Communist Party-controlled newspaper posted video clips that appear to show Ms. Peng eating at a restaurant and attending a tennis event in Beijing.A top official in women’s tennis, Steve Simon, said it was “positive” to see the videos, though he said he remained skeptical that Ms. Peng was making decisions freely. China’s authoritarian government has a long record of iron-fisted treatment of people who threaten to undermine public confidence in the party’s senior leaders.With only a few months to go before Beijing hosts the 2022 Winter Olympic Games, Ms. Peng’s case could become another point of tension in China’s increasingly fractious relationship with the wider world.Who Is Ms. Peng?Peng Shuai, 35 — her family name is pronounced “pung,” and the end of her given name rhymes with “why” — is a three-time Olympian whose tennis career began more than two decades ago.In February 2014, after winning the doubles crown at Wimbledon with Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan the year before, Ms. Peng rose to become a world No. 1 in doubles, the first Chinese player, male or female, to attain the top rank in either singles or doubles. She and Ms. Hsieh took the 2014 French Open doubles title as well.Her doubles career underwent a resurgence in 2016 and 2017. But in 2018, she was barred from professional play for six months, with a three-month suspension, after she was found to have tried to use “coercion” and financial incentives to change her Wimbledon doubles partner after the sign-in deadline. She has not competed professionally since early 2020.Why Did She Disappear?Late in the evening on Nov. 2, Ms. Peng posted a long note on the Chinese social platform Weibo that exploded across the Chinese internet.In the posting, she accused Zhang Gaoli, 75, a former vice premier, of inviting her to his home about three years ago and coercing her into sex. “That afternoon, I didn’t consent at first,” she wrote. “I was crying the entire time.”She and Mr. Zhang began a consensual, if conflicted, relationship after that, she wrote. Mr. Zhang had served from 2012 to 2017 on China’s top ruling body, the Politburo Standing Committee.Within minutes, censors scrubbed Ms. Peng’s account from the Chinese internet. A digital blackout on her accusations has been in place ever since.Women in China who come forward as victims of sexual assault and predation have long been met with censorship and pushback. But Ms. Peng’s account, which has not been corroborated, is the first to implicate such a high-level Communist Party leader, which is why the authorities may have been extra diligent in silencing all discussion of the matter, at one point even blocking online searches for the word “tennis.”How Has the World Responded?The censors might have succeeded had Mr. Simon, the head of the Women’s Tennis Association, not spoken out on Nov. 14, calling on Beijing to investigate Ms. Peng’s accusations and stop trying to bury her case.Confronting China has come with substantial consequences for other sports organizations. But Mr. Simon told CNN that the WTA was prepared to pull its business out of China over the matter.Fellow tennis luminaries — the list so far includes Naomi Osaka, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, Serena Williams, Rafael Nadal and Billie Jean King — have been speaking out in support of Ms. Peng. The Spanish soccer star Gerard Piqué posted with the hashtag #WhereIsPengShuai to his 20 million Twitter followers.The Biden Administration and United Nations human rights office have joined the calls for Beijing to provide proof of Ms. Peng’s well-being.The International Olympic Committee initially said that it was satisfied with reports that she was safe, though it later suggested that it was engaging in “quiet diplomacy” to untangle the situation. In an interview with Reuters, the committee’s longest-serving member, Dick Pound, said he doubted the issue would lead to a cancellation of the Winter Games. But he also couldn’t rule it out, he said.“If that’s not resolved in a sensible way very soon it may spin out of control,” Mr. Pound told the news agency.On Saturday, The Wall Street Journal published an essay by Enes Kanter, a center for the Boston Celtics, in which he called for the Winter Games to be moved from Beijing. Mr. Kanter has been a vocal critic of the Chinese government, assailing its policies in Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan.The National Basketball Association’s streaming partner in China has pulled Celtics games from its platform in response.“All the gold medals in the world aren’t worth selling your values and your principles to the Chinese Communist Party,” Mr. Kanter wrote in The Journal.What Has China Said?Nothing. Not officially, at least.Instead, Chinese state-run news organizations and their employees have been the sole quasi-official voices from the country to weigh in. Notably, they are doing so on Twitter, which is blocked within China. Their messages appear to be aimed specifically at persuading the wider world.First, a Chinese state broadcaster posted an email on Twitter, written in English and attributed to Ms. Peng, that disavowed the assault accusation and said she was just “resting at home.” Mr. Simon dismissed the email as a crude fabrication and said it only deepened his concerns for the tennis star’s safety.Then, Hu Xijin, the editor in chief of the state-controlled newspaper Global Times, began sharing videos that appear to show Ms. Peng with his 450,000 Twitter followers.In Mr. Hu’s first Twitter remarks on the subject, he said he didn’t believe Ms. Peng was being punished “for the thing that people talked about,” declining even to state the nature of her accusations.On Saturday, Mr. Hu posted two video clips that he said he had “acquired.”In one clip, a man is speaking with a woman who appears to be Ms. Peng at a restaurant when he refers to tomorrow as Nov. 20. Another woman at the table corrects him, saying tomorrow is the 21st. Ms. Peng nods in agreement.The man appears to be Zhang Junhui, an executive with the China Open tennis tournament.On Sunday, Mr. Hu posted another clip, which he said had been shot by a Global Times employee, that shows Ms. Peng at the opening ceremony of a tennis event in Beijing. Zhang Junhui seems to be standing to Ms. Peng’s right.The China Open posted photos from the same event on its Weibo account on Sunday. The photos show Ms. Peng waving to the crowd and autographing tennis balls, although the post does not name her.Mr. Hu has not shared any of these videos on Weibo, where he has 24 million followers.In a statement, Mr. Simon of the WTA said the clips alone were “insufficient” to prove that Ms. Peng was not facing coercion.“Our relationship with China is at a crossroads,” he said. More

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      Peng Shuai Said to Be in Videos From China's State Media

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      The editor of a state-run newspaper on Saturday shared clips said to be of the Chinese tennis star on Twitter. But they are unverified, and the head of the WTA called them “insufficient.”Nearly two weeks after people across the world began asking “Where is Peng Shuai?,” two questionable videos surfaced Saturday on social media of a person who appears to be the Chinese tennis star at a restaurant.The videos were shared on Twitter by the editor of a state-run newspaper, but the seemingly unnatural conversation in one video and the unclear location and dates of both raised questions about Peng’s safety and whether she was appearing in the videos of her own free will. A third video, said to be of Peng at a tennis match in Beijing, was posted about 10 hours later, on Sunday.Peng, in a social media post this month, accused a former top government official of sexually assaulting her. After the allegation, the Chinese government removed almost all references of Peng on social media within the country, and Peng disappeared from public life. Her absence prompted outrage across the world, especially from top officials and stars in tennis.Steve Simon, the chief executive of the WTA, the women’s professional tennis tour, has particularly been strident, demanding verifiable proof that Peng is safe and can move about society as she pleases and that officials fully investigate her allegations. If that does not occur, Simon said the WTA would stop playing tennis tournaments in China.On Saturday, after the videos surfaced, Simon continued to express frustration with the inability to independently verify Peng’s well-being and said that the organization’s “relationship with China is at a crossroads.”“While it is positive to see her, it remains unclear if she is free and able to make decisions and take actions on her own, without coercion or external interference,” he said. “This video alone is insufficient.”Peng, 35, is the only Chinese tennis player to have attained a world No. 1 ranking, in women’s doubles, and she was once heralded by the Chinese government as a model athlete.The video clips were posted on the Twitter account of Hu Xijin, the chief editor of The Global Times, an influential Communist Party newspaper, who described them as showing Peng having dinner with her coach and friends on Saturday.He wrote that he had “acquired” the clips but offered no explanation of how, and the clips appeared staged to establish the date. In the first clip, the man said to be Peng’s coach is discussing plans with her and asks, “Isn’t tomorrow Nov. 20?” A woman sitting next to Peng corrects him and says it will be Nov. 21. He then repeats the date twice.In the second clip, a woman wearing a mask, presumably Peng, is shown walking into a restaurant. The camera pauses on a sign indicating the date of the last cleaning, a common sight in Chinese buildings since the SARS epidemic. But only the month, November, is visible; the date appears to be obscured.Hu posted a third video hours later, describing it as the opening ceremony of a teen tennis match final in Beijing on Sunday to which Peng “showed up.”On Friday, a journalist for another Chinese media entity released pictures said to be of Peng in what appeared to be a bedroom, surrounded by stuffed animals. In those photos, Peng appeared younger than she did in more recent images of her and there was nothing to verify when they had been taken.Also on Friday, Simon wrote to China’s ambassador to the United States to reiterate his complaints and his threat to remove the nine tournaments the WTA holds in China, including the prestigious WTA Finals in Shenzhen. All of the tournaments in China this year were canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. The WTA Finals were completed on Wednesday in Guadalajara, Mexico.If Peng is not able to speak freely, Simon wrote, “we have grave concerns that any of our players will be safe in China.”The men’s tennis tour has voiced its concern but has yet to threaten to pull its tournaments from China.The controversy surrounding Peng comes a little more than two months before the start of the Winter Olympics in Beijing, raising the specter of one of the world’s largest sporting events taking place in a country where a three-time Olympian tennis star is missing.The International Olympic Committee has said that it believes “quiet diplomacy” will provide the best chance for resolving the situation. On Friday, Dick Pound, an I.O.C. member, told Reuters that if the situation with Peng is “not resolved in a sensible way very soon, it may spin out of control.” He added: “Whether that escalates to a cessation of the Olympic Games, I doubt it. But you never know.”Simon has spent more than a week trying to establish personal contact with Peng through a series of phone numbers and other digital contacts but has not been able to speak with her.The videos on Saturday were the latest media released by a Chinese-controlled entity trying to establish Peng’s safety. Earlier this week, China’s state-owned broadcaster released a message supposedly from her.“Hello everyone this is Peng Shuai,” it read. It called the accusation of sexual assault, which was made just weeks ago, untrue. “I’m not missing, nor am I unsafe,” the message said. “I’ve been resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me.”Simon quickly denounced the release of the message.“I have a hard time believing that Peng Shuai actually wrote the email we received or believes what is being attributed to her,” he said.Peng has accused Zhang Gaoli, 75, a former vice premier of China, of sexually assaulting her at his home three years ago. In a post on her verified account on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, Peng wrote that the assault occurred after Zhang invited her to play tennis at his home. “I was so scared that afternoon,” she said. “I never gave consent, crying the entire time.”She also described having had an on-and-off consensual relationship with Zhang.Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said on Friday that the Biden administration was paying close attention to the situation and was “deeply concerned.” She called on the Chinese government to provide “independent, verifiable proof” of Peng’s whereabouts.In recent days, several notable names in tennis have joined the chorus of demanding proof that Peng is safe.“We need to see her in a live video holding up a newspaper from today or better yet, hitting balls,” Patrick McEnroe, the former player and ESPN commentator, said in an interview on Friday. McEnroe coached Peng earlier in her career in World Team Tennis.“If none of that happens, and people I talk to say if the Chinese really don’t care about what we think, and we never hear from Peng or have a clue, the only real recourse left is for professional tennis to pull all its tournaments from China,” he said.Serena Williams, Naomi Osaka, Simona Halep and Coco Gauff are among the current women’s players who have posted on social media about their concern for Peng. Novak Djokovic shared a statement from the Professional Tennis Players Association, of which he is a co-founder.Martina Navratilova, the former champion who defected from Czechoslovakia in 1975 to escape the communist government, is also speaking out about Peng.“I don’t believe a word they are saying,” Navratilova said of the Chinese government in an interview on Saturday. “There is a lot of subterfuge going on here.” More