Simon, Steve (1955- )

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      Saudi Arabia, Creator of LIV Golf, Casts Its Eye on Women’s Tennis

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      The kingdom shook up the PGA Tour with the creation of the LIV Golf series. Now it is pushing to secure a WTA Tour event.With the golf world already divided over Saudi Arabia’s emergence as a powerful force in the game, another major sport is contending with whether to do business with the kingdom.This time it’s women’s tennis, which pulled out of China last year over concerns for the welfare of a player who accused a Chinese vice premier of sexual assault and later disappeared from sight.Saudi Arabia has approached the Women’s Tennis Association about hosting an event, possibly the Tour Finals, but the WTA has not entertained the prospect of a tournament there in any formal fashion.Steve Simon, chief executive of the WTA, declined to be interviewed for this article, but a spokeswoman, Amy Binder, confirmed Saudi Arabia’s interest, saying in a statement, “As a global organization, we are appreciative of inquiries received from anywhere in the world and we look seriously at what each opportunity may bring.”In recent weeks, professional golf has been upended by the start of the LIV Golf Invitational series, which is bankrolled by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and is paying $4 million prizes to tournament winners, along with participation fees reportedly as high as $200 million. Players like Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson who have left the PGA Tour and joined LIV Golf have been accused by other players of helping the kingdom to “sportswash” its human rights abuses, among them the 2018 government-sponsored killing of the Saudi journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi.Saudi Arabia’s interest in tennis was first reported by The Telegraph in Britain.The kingdom in recent years has invested heavily in sports and cultural events as part of a broader effort to project a new image around the world. The women’s tennis tour would be likely to face questions if it staged events in Saudi Arabia, where women’s rights have been curtailed and women gained the right to drive only in 2018. (Saudi Arabia has staged professional women’s golf events, hosting official Ladies European Tour stops each of the last three years.)Peng Shuai of China at the 2019 Australian Open.Edgar Su/ReutersWhen the veteran Chinese player Peng Shuai disappeared last year, Simon demanded a full investigation of her allegations. Peng eventually reappeared, but when Chinese authorities did not allow Peng to meet independently with Simon and the WTA, Simon suspended all of the tour’s business in China, including its 10-year deal to hold the Tour Finals in Shenzen.It was a significant financial blow to the WTA. China had paid a record $14 million in prize money in 2019, the first year of the agreement. That was double the amount of prize money from 2018, when the WTA Finals finished its five-year run in Singapore. The WTA relocated the finals last year to Guadalajara, Mexico, which offered only $5 million in prize money and a drastically reduced payment for the right to host the event.WTA leaders have yet to announce the WTA Finals host city for 2022, and it remains a challenge, with the longer-term Shenzhen deal still in place, to find candidates interested in bidding for the Finals for just one year.Saudi Arabia, with its appetite for international sport and huge financial resources, fits the profile of a potential bidder.“They are interested in women’s sports, and they are interested in big events, so for sure,” said the Austrian businessman and tennis tournament promoter Peter-Michael Reichel.The WTA has held events in Arab countries, including Qatar and Dubai, for years. But Saudi Arabia has yet to secure an official tour event in men’s or women’s tennis despite making increasingly serious offers.Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic were set to play an exhibition there in December 2018 but were put under pressure to cancel it after the assassination of Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October of that year. The exhibition match was eventually called off with Nadal citing an ankle injury.Daniil Medvedev of Russia played at an event in Diriyah, Saudi Arabia, in 2019.Fayez Nureldine/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesA year later, an eight-man tennis exhibition was played in Riyadh in December 2019 ahead of the start of the regular men’s tennis season. The Diriyah Tennis Cup featured the leading ATP players Daniil Medvedev of Russia, Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland and John Isner of the United States and was played in a temporary 15,000-seat stadium. Prince Abdul Aziz bin Turki al-Faisal, chairman of the Saudi General Sports Authority, called hosting the event “another watershed moment for the kingdom” and hit the ceremonial first serve.Reichel helped organize the 2019 exhibition through his company RBG. He said the exhibition had to be canceled in 2020 and 2021 because of the pandemic but that the plan was to revive the event later this year and include a women’s exhibition tournament.“I’m very optimistic we can develop the tennis business there,” Reichel said in a telephone interview from London on Thursday.Reichel said he believes it’s appropriate for sports to do business with Saudi Arabia, which he said has advanced as a society since he first went there on business in 1983.“I was so positively surprised,” he said. “I was there many times. The international image is talking about the murder of Khashoggi and the driving licenses for women. This is what people know, and there is much more to be reported, I think.”Reichel’s company owns and operates the WTA tournament in Linz, Austria, and the ATP tournament in Hamburg, Germany. He is a member of the WTA board of directors and has been one of those lobbying for Saudi Arabia to have an official tour event. But for now, those efforts have fallen short. The ATP recently rebuffed a proposal that Reichel was involved in to relocate an existing event to Saudi Arabia.A Quick Guide to the LIV Golf SeriesCard 1 of 6A new series. More

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      Where Is Peng Shuai? Tennis Players and Fans Still Want to Know

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      A central question, “Where is Peng Shuai?”, has represented concern for the star but also points to related questions about the future of tennis in China.MELBOURNE, Australia — Xiao, a Chinese-born and Melbourne-based artist, was disturbed that the plight of the Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai had slipped off the radar ahead of the first Grand Slam tournament of the year. So she designed a T-shirt, and much to the dismay of Australian Open organizers, wore it to Melbourne Park.Xiao was concerned that the unvaccinated tennis star Novak Djokovic’s fight with the Australian government had overshadowed the plight of Peng, one of China’s most popular tennis stars, who has mostly disappeared from public view since she accused a former top Chinese leader of sexual assault. Xiao’s shirt had on the front a picture of Peng’s face and on the back the slogan “Where is Peng Shuai?”, a message that has been used heavily online as a call to confront the Chinese Communist Party about the #MeToo accusation that prompted the women’s tennis tour to suspend its tournaments in China.Security guards later told Xiao, who also brought a sign with the slogan, that the items were not permitted, citing a tournament policy banning fans from making political statements.“It’s a reminder for people to not forget about Peng Shuai, especially since we had a huge Djokovic drama recently,” said Xiao, 26, who spoke on the condition that her full name not be used because of concerns for her safety after calling out the Chinese government.On Tuesday, after criticism from the 18-time major singles champion Martina Navratilova and others, the Australian Open softened its policy and is now allowing T-shirts and other personal messages supporting Peng, who has remained top of mind for many people involved in women’s tennis since her accusation first surfaced in November.Xiao’s shirt in support of Peng Shuai, which was banned by security guards at the tournament, though the ban was later reversed.Ben RothenbergPeng, a U.S. Open singles semifinalist and former world No. 1 in doubles, said then — in a post on her verified account on the social media site Weibo — that she had been sexually assaulted by Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier of China. In the post, Peng wrote that they had once been involved in a consensual relationship.The post was taken down minutes later. Online discussion of the allegation was censored within China, and Peng disappeared from public view for weeks while tennis officials and fellow players tried unsuccessfully to reach her. Peng, a three-time Olympian, later had conversations via video with International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and other Olympic officials.In a statement after the first of those meetings in November, the I.O.C. announced that Peng had said she was “safe and well,” and she has since been seen publicly in China in several social media posts. On Dec. 1, Steve Simon, chief executive of the Women’s Tennis Association, suspended tournaments in the country and renewed his call for a “full and transparent” investigation from the Chinese authorities.Peng later told a reporter for a Singaporean newspaper in Beijing that her initial post had been misunderstood and that she had “never said or written that anyone has sexually assaulted me.”What to Know About Peng ShuaiThe Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai disappeared from public view for weeks after she accused a top Chinese leader of sexual assault.What Happened: The athlete’s vanishing and subsequent reappearance in several videos prompted global concern over her well-being.A Silencing Operation: China turned to a tested playbook to stamp out discussion and shift the narrative. The effort didn’t always succeed.Eluding the Censors: Supporters of the tennis star found creative ways to voice their frustration online.A Sudden Reversal: Ms. Peng retracted her accusation in an interview in December. But her words seemed unlikely to quell fears for her safety.But the WTA, whose leaders still have been unable to make direct contact with Peng, has not softened its stance or its demands, fearing that she has been coerced into the retraction.“We appreciate seeing the support continue for Peng Shuai,” Simon said Wednesday in an email. “The WTA is proud of Peng Shuai in speaking out for what is right, and we continue with our unwavering call for confirmation of Peng’s safety along with a full, fair and transparent investigation, without censorship, into her allegation of sexual assault. This is an issue that can never fade away.”Magda Linette, a leading Polish player and member of the WTA player council, said she hoped Peng could speak with players directly or with Simon. “If we could see her in an environment where we know she is not being really controlled and we can have at least a conversation, because she has been refusing that, I think that would be a really good step to trying to rebuild the trust, trying to rebuild the relationship again to see how things are going and how she is actually,” Linette said.In a photo made available by the International Olympic Committee, I.O.C. President Thomas Bach speaking with Peng Shuai during a videoconference.Greg Martin/OIS/IOC/EPA-EFE, via ShutterstockAlizé Cornet of France, a quarterfinalist at the Australian Open and one of the players to raise concerns about Peng’s safety in November, said some of her fears had been allayed.“It’s not the huge concern I had in November where I imagined she might have been buried in a ditch,” Cornet said last week.Cornet added that she believed that Peng was not in physical danger, but that “I’m concerned to know how things will go for her and what will become of her.”The renewed attention on Peng comes at a politically sensitive time with the Winter Olympics scheduled to begin in Beijing on Feb. 4. “It is kind of sad to see her story, especially when we are technically in an Asia-Pacific Slam, kind of not be a topic anymore,” said Jessica Pegula, an American player who reached the quarterfinals in Melbourne. “It’s disappointing, but it is kind of how the media is. Stuff blows up. Then it goes away, and it blows up again, and something else comes.”Pegula, who said she was not reassured by Peng’s recent video appearances, added: “Maybe it will catch up more when the Olympics come around.”The Australian Open, one of the four Grand Slam tennis tournaments, has long positioned itself as the “Grand Slam of Asia-Pacific” in part because of concerns that China or another nation in the region might attempt to usurp its status. A state-owned Chinese liquor company, Luzhou Laojiao, has been a major tournament sponsor since 2019 and holds the naming rights for one of the principal show courts. Tennis Australia, which runs the event, has an office and presence in China and has backed tournaments in China that awarded wild-card entries into the Australian Open.Branding for Luzhou Laojiao’s Guojiao 1573 beverage is displayed prominently at the Australian Open.Alana Holmberg for The New York TimesThe Australian Open also has an agreement with CCTV, the national Chinese broadcaster, which has been broadcasting men’s and women’s matches from this Australian Open.But Chinese television did not broadcast the women’s tournaments in 2022 that were played ahead of the Open despite owning the rights. It is unclear whether this constitutes a boycott. In 2019, CCTV stopped airing N.B.A. games after Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Houston Rockets at the time, expressed support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.No events for the WTA or ATP, the professional men’s tennis tour, have been held in China since early 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic, which had shut down international sports events in the country before the upcoming Olympics. The WTA had made China one of the pillars of its tour and agreed to a lucrative 10-year deal to stage its year-end championships, the WTA Finals, in Shenzhen. But the event, first held there in 2019, was moved to Guadalajara, Mexico, last year because of the pandemic with just eight weeks to prepare.The WTA would need to lift the suspension on Chinese tournaments if they were to take place this year. The China swing is scheduled for September, October and November. The WTA has not given a deadline but wants to finalize its fall schedule much earlier than it did in 2021. With China unlikely to launch a formal investigation into Peng’s allegations of sexual assault, cancellation of this year’s China swing appears likely, although Simon has said that this would not necessarily end the tour’s commitment to Chinese tournaments in 2023 and beyond.The ATP has made statements of support for Peng but has not suspended any events as a result of her situation. Pegula said she was disappointed the ATP had not done more. “I just think it was the right thing to do,” she said. “I wish they would have, and I guess they still could. We’ll see.”Reilly Opelka, one of the leading American male players, called the ATP’s hands-off approach “lame” and “weak.”“We rely so much less on China than the WTA does and look at that statement,” he said. “And that digs into a deeper problem: Why didn’t enough ATP players speak out? Is it conflicts of interest? It’s hard to say.”Interest in tennis in China boomed after Li Na became the country’s first Grand Slam singles champion, winning the 2011 French Open and 2014 Australian Open. Though no Chinese player has matched those results, promising talents are on the rise, including Wang Xinyu, a tall and powerful 20-year-old who pushed the No. 2-seeded Aryna Sabalenka to three sets in the second round of the Australian Open last week.Chinese players in Melbourne have refused one-on-one interviews with The New York Times, but Xu Yifan, a women’s doubles specialist, said during a news conference that it was important for tennis’ future in China to have tour events in the country. “Especially for Chinese players, we all enjoy,” said Xu, who declined to comment on Peng Shuai’s situation.“We didn’t really focus on it,” she said. “We just tried to focus on our tennis most of the time.”The WTA may be able to cover much of its lost Chinese revenue by adding events elsewhere. But there is still concern about the future.“We had a bunch of amazing tournaments in China, and I think in response, they’ve had so many players coming up and really have now so many juniors that are really good and tennis has been the strongest ever really in China,” Linette said. “So, I think for both of us, for the sake of the WTA and for China if it wants that their players keep developing and still have a chance to go out and do something more in tennis, it’s better for both that this situation be resolved in a peaceful manner.”For now, it remains a delicate dance. The artist Xiao said she hesitated before bringing her message of support for Peng to the Australian Open. “But I just feel like I had to do what I had to do,” she said.Spectators showed their support for Peng Shuai as Nick Kyrgios played doubles with Thanasi Kokkinakis.Dave Hunt/EPA, via ShutterstockXiao described the atmosphere on her first day at the tournament, Wednesday, as “quite chill.” “Two guards came and they just asked me, ‘Oh, what is Peng Shuai?’” Xiao recalled. “We explained to them the situation and they just said, ‘Oh, that’s an unfortunate story,’ and they just left. They were really nice about it, actually.”After posting pictures of her protest at the tournament on social media, Xiao was contacted by local activists who wanted to join her. On Friday, they went to a third-round women’s singles match featuring the Chinese player Wang Qiang, hoping they would be seen on broadcasts of the match back in China.While the group was moving between Wang’s match and a Naomi Osaka practice session, the situation turned more confrontational, leaving Xiao “on the verge of a panic attack” as an encounter between the activists and security guards was filmed for use on the activists’ social media accounts.Xiao said she was offered a chance to stay at the tournament if she stashed the offending items in a booth outside the entrance but chose to leave Melbourne Park instead. Hours later, on Friday evening, Xiao returned and wrote “Where is Peng Shuai?” in chalk on an exterior wall of the tournament grounds.Xiao said she “knew the rules from the beginning” against political banners at the tournament and was not surprised that Tennis Australia initially enforced them.“I kind of expect it,” Xiao said, “because they have Chinese sponsors, right?”Xiao’s graffiti on the exterior wall of the tournament grounds.Ben RothenbergCraig Tiley, chief executive of Tennis Australia, said in an interview on Monday that the tournament’s view was not influenced by its Chinese commercial interests. He said Tennis Australia backed the WTA’s stance on Peng Shuai and had attempted to use its connections in China to establish contact with her.“It doesn’t have to just be on a political or commercial issue,” Tiley said. “If we make the assessment that they come in to disrupt the comfort and safety of our fans, it’s not going to be welcome. But if they want to come in with a T-shirt and it says, ‘Where is Peng Shuai?’ they can do that. We don’t have a problem with that.”The shift by tournament officials does not change the question posed by Xiao and others. The activists who joined the artist have raised money to pay for a thousand more T-shirts that they plan to hand out to spectators before the women’s singles final. More

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      Putting Principles Before Profits, Steve Simon Takes a Stand

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      The WTA chief has spent years in tennis working quietly to put players first. Suspending tournaments in China over the treatment of star Peng Shuai has made him the most talked-about leader in sports.Guadalajara, Mexico, gave a party for women’s tennis last month, and when it ended, with Garbiñe Muguruza winning the WTA Finals, the season’s last tournament, confetti fell through the air and a mariachi band turned the Akron Tennis Stadium into a fiesta.In the middle of it, Steve Simon, the bespectacled chairman and chief executive of the WTA Tour, stood quietly and unsmiling in a blue business suit with his hands clasped. He shared the occasional quiet word with Chris Evert and Billie Jean King, or one of the local officials he had helped persuade into holding the event on short notice, after the regular host, Shenzhen, China, pulled out because of the pandemic.Simon had plenty else on his mind. As the tournament and closing celebration unfolded, a geopolitical crisis with women’s tennis at its center had occupied much of his time and he was leading the tour down an uncertain path.On Nov. 2, the Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai accused Zhang Gaoli, a former vice premier of China, of sexually assaulting her in social media posts that were quickly deleted.The Chinese government removed all mentions of Peng’s accusation, and coverage of Peng from news media outside China has been censored. She largely disappeared from public life, and Simon has been unable to communicate with her despite repeated attempts.On Nov. 13, Simon went public with his frustration, demanding that he and the WTA be able to speak with Peng independently and that Chinese officials conduct a transparent investigation into her allegations. If they did not comply, Simon said, the WTA would consider removing its nine tournaments from China, including the Tour Finals, moves that could cost women’s tennis tens and perhaps hundreds, of millions of dollars over the next decade.On Wednesday, Simon followed through on his threat, announcing that after weeks of failed attempts to communicate with Peng, and no sign of an investigation or evidence that Peng can speak freely, the WTA was immediately suspending all of its tournaments in China. Simon’s stridency, in contrast to other international sports leagues and organizations that do business in China, has turned Simon, a mild-mannered former tournament director who prefers to operate in the background and leave the spotlight to his star players, into the most talked-about leader in sports.“This is not where I wanted to end up,” Simon said in an interview Wednesday night, speaking about the WTA Tour, but also, in a sense, about himself.Peng Shuai competing at the Australian Open in 2017.Clive Brunskill/Getty Images“I don’t want this to be about me,” he added. “Nothing prepared me for it, other than just trying to do what is right and communicating that with the players.”Simon’s refusal to accept China’s authoritarian stance on human rights once it directly affected one of his players stands in stark contrast to several high-profile leaders in sports who have repeatedly bent to the desires of the Chinese, including Adam Silver, the commissioner of the N.B.A., and Thomas Bach, the president of the International Olympic Committee.Simon has been concerned about Peng’s physical safety but also believed, as did the members of his player council and others he communicates with regularly in a player chat group, that the silencing of Peng and her sexual assault allegation amounted to a direct attack on the principle of equality upon which the WTA was founded.“It’s now December and we’ve not seen any meaningful progress,” he said Wednesday night.Simon, a 66-year-old Southern California native, played tennis at Long Beach State University and mixed doubles at Wimbledon in 1981 alongside Lea Antonoplis. He has spent his adult life in tennis coaching, running the tennis program for Adidas, and organizing and eventually directing the BNP Paribas Open, a joint men’s and women’s event in Indian Wells, Calif., known as the fifth Grand Slam.All along, Simon was quietly gaining authority within tennis circles, even if few of the players knew him particularly well. He began serving on the board of the WTA in 2004.In 2009, he worked to get Stacey Allaster, then the president of the WTA, appointed as the next chief executive. Allaster said during a rough moment for her candidacy, she privately asked Simon if he might be a better fit to lead the organization.“Without a blink he turned to me and said, ‘No, we’re going to stay the course,’” Allaster said.Six years later, after Allaster decided to step down, the WTA board unanimously selected Simon to succeed her. He has since cultivated the support of the sport’s biggest stars of the present and past, including Serena Williams and King, the founder of the WTA, while maintaining his decades-long relationships with the tournament directors who were his initial base of support.“He’s a rarity in sports,” said John Tobias, a prominent tennis agent who represents Sloane Stephens, the 2017 U.S. Open women’s singles champion. “An executive who is always trying to put the focus on the tour and the players.”Before this month, Simon was best known for the work he performed behind the scenes, along with the former pro Charlie Pasarell and others, to bring Venus and Serena Williams back to Indian Wells after a 14-year absence. Serena Williams was ceaselessly booed by fans after her sister withdrew from a semifinal match between them. Williams believed that race had played a role in how fans treated her. She said at the time that Simon spent a long time listening to what she had to say on the matter and that played a major role in her decision to return.Understand the Disappearance of Peng ShuaiCard 1 of 5Where is Peng Shuai? 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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      Where Is Peng Shuai? The Question the I.O.C. Is Too Weak To Ask.

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      Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai went missing after publicly accusing a former government official of sexual assault. Tennis stars, led by Naomi Osaka, and the WTA have all asked #whereispengshuai?Where is Peng Shuai?That’s the question the International Olympic Committee and its president, Thomas Bach, should be shouting right now — loud, demanding, and aimed squarely at the leadership in China, set to host the Beijing Games in February. But instead of firm demands, we’re hearing not much more than faint, servile whispers from Olympic leadership.Peng, 35, a Chinese tennis star and three-time Olympian, has 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.Peng wrote that the assault occurred after Zhang invited her to play tennis at his home. “I was so scared that afternoon,” she noted. “I never gave consent, crying the entire time.”“I feel like a walking corpse,” she added.The message was quickly deleted from China’s government-controlled social media site.There have been no verifiable signs of Peng since — no videos or photographs to prove she is safe. Instead, all the outside world has seen is a stilted message, said to have been written by Peng and sent to the WTA, in response to its demand for an inquiry into her allegations. Peng’s supposed response, released by China’s state-owned broadcaster on Wednesday, immediately raised concerns.“Hello everyone this is Peng Shuai,” it read, before calling her accusation of sexual assault, made just weeks ago, untrue. “I’m not missing, nor am I unsafe. I’ve been resting at home and everything is fine. Thank you again for caring about me.”It reads like a message from a hostage, a natural concern given the Chinese government’s long history of using force and heavy-handed pressure to crush dissent and flatten those it deems guilty of going against the state.So, what has been the I.O.C.’s response to a potentially endangered Olympian? A neutered, obsequious statement.“We have seen the latest reports and are encouraged by assurances that she is safe,” read an official I.O.C. declaration on Thursday.What world of fantasy is the I.O.C. living in? Given China’s history, we can reasonably assume the latest missive supposedly written by Peng is a fraud. Peng dared to speak up with force and candor, but not the I.O.C., a Swiss-based organization with a history of cowing to dictators that goes back to Adolf Hitler and the 1936 Summer Games.After some criticism, the committee followed up with another statement, hinting its representatives were talking to the Chinese.“Experience shows that quiet diplomacy offers the best opportunity to find a solution for questions of such nature,” it said, offering no evidence of prior success. “This explains why the IOC will not comment any further at this stage.”Responding to a message purportedly written by Peng, the I.O.C. said in a statement, “We have seen the latest reports and are encouraged by assurances that she is safe.” Valery Gache/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBach and the wide cast of leadership at the I.O.C. typically use every chance possible to claim the Olympic mission stands for humanity’s highest ideals. They say all Olympic athletes are part of a family. Peng was among those ranks in 2008, 2012 and 2016. Once an Olympian, they say, always an Olympian.That’s an admirable idea, but it gets tossed to the wayside when the stakes grow too high.Looming are Beijing’s Winter Games, fueled by huge fees for broadcasting rights and corporate sponsorships and the billions spent by the Chinese government in an effort to gain respect on the international stage.Do Bach and the I.O.C. have the guts to stand up for one of their own and call out the dictatorial host of its next showcase for a frightening human rights abuse?The answer, so far at least, is no.Contrary to the official I.O.C. statement, nothing is encouraging about this situation.Not if you know the long history of Chinese authoritarianism. Not if you know how it has been hammering at dissent and silencing anyone with enough clout to threaten national order — including prominent cultural and business figures like Jack Ma, founder of the internet firm Alibaba.Not if you know about how China has suppressed protest in Hong Kong and Tibet, or if you pay attention to the treatment of Muslim minorities — deemed genocide by the United Nations and dozens of nations, including the United States — despite Chinese denials.As predicted by critics, or anyone watching with even a bit of common sense, the I.O.C. finds itself compromised. That’s the cost of cozying up to authoritarian hosts like China, which held the Summer Games in 2008, and Russia, the site of the 2014 Winter Games.Compare the typical fecklessness of Bach and the I.O.C. with the uncompromising approach taken by the women’s pro tennis tour, which has been unafraid to stand up boldly for Peng, a former world No. 1 in doubles.“I have a hard time believing that Peng Shuai actually wrote the email we received or believe what is being attributed to her,” wrote Steve Simon, chief executive of the WTA Tour, in a statement. “Peng Shuai displayed incredible courage in describing an allegation of sexual assault against a former top official in the Chinese government.”Simon continued: “Peng Shuai must be allowed to speak freely, without coercion or intimidation from any source. Her allegation of sexual assault must be respected, investigated with full transparency and without censorship.The voices of women need to be heard and respected, not censored nor dictated to.”That’s putting people over profit. That’s guts. Professional tennis in China is a lucrative, fast-growing market. The men’s and women’s tours hold high-profile tournaments there, and the WTA Finals are slated for Shenzhen in 2022.Given the way female tennis players have long led on matters of human rights, it is no surprise that Billie Jean King, Serena Williams, Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova have stood strongly for Peng. And it is no surprise younger stars have followed suit, led by Naomi Osaka, the torch bearer in the Tokyo Games this past summer, who has added her significant stature to the chorus asking “Where is Peng Shuai?”But Bach and the I.O.C., peddlers of Olympic mythology, have yet to join that chorus. Peng Shuai is part of the Olympic family, but the I.O.C. overlords lack the spine to stand up for one of their own. More