Afghan Female Olympian Goes Missing

July 10, 2008 -- LONDON -- The only female athlete on Afghanistan's team for the Beijing Olympics has gone missing from a training camp in Italy and apparently is seeking political asylum in Norway.

Mehboba Ahdyar, a 19-year-old runner who competes in the 800 meters and 1,500 meters, hasn't been heard from since leaving the training center in Formia last week. Her luggage and passport also were gone.

"The IOC accepts that athletes sometimes feel they have to make hard choices to improve their lives," International Olympic Committee spokeswoman Emmanuelle Moreau said Thursday. "It would appear this is what has happened in this case."

Ahdyar, part of Afghanistan's four-member Olympic team, had been training for the Aug. 8-24 Games on an IOC scholarship program that assists athletes from smaller and less-developed nations.

She began training in April at a high-performance center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and moved in early June to the pre-Games facility in Formia, south of Rome, where she was supposed to stay until July 7.

"She's gone missing," Moreau said. "We don't have any official information. We only know that she might be seeking asylum in Norway."

The IOC has had no word from Ahdyar and is in contact with Afghanistan's national Olympic committee and the International Association of Athletics Federations.

"On July 4, she left with her bags and passports, and we have not heard from her since," IAAF spokesman Nick Davies said. "We have heard nothing from her directly."

In Kabul, the deputy chairman of the Afghan Olympic body, Sayed Mahmoud Zia Dashti, said Ahdyar had a leg injury and was receiving treatment in Italy.

"I can confirm that she has injured her leg and that she has will not participate in the Beijing Olympics and that her family in Italy is taking care of her," he said.

There had been fears that Ahdyar's disappearance could be linked to death threats from Muslim extremists in Afghanistan opposed to women running in the Olympics.

Afghanistan was banned from the 2000 Sydney Olympics, because the Taliban regime in power at the time barred women from taking part in the Games.