Organisers of the Australian Open gave in to activist pressure this week and reversed a ban on T-shirts supporting Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai.
According to the BBC, security staff last week asked spectators to remove T-shirts and a banner saying ‘Where is Peng Shuai?’ before entering the grounds.
Peng vanished for weeks after accusing a top Chinese official in November of sexual misconduct. Though she afterwards reappeared, many remain concerned about her wellbeing.
Initially, Tennis Australia said it had a ‘longstanding policy of not allowing banners, signs or clothing that are commercial or political’.
Yesterday, however, Tennis Australia chief executive Craig Tiley told reporters that spectators at the Australia Open would now be allowed to wear the T-shirt (bearing the words ‘Where is Peng Shuai?’) as long as they attended matches without any ‘intent to disrupt’, and were ‘peaceful’.
The earlier decision to ban the shirt was met with fierce criticism from human rights groups and the international tennis community, with some suggesting that organisers were bowing to pressure from major Chinese corporate sponsors.
Australia’s defence minister Peter Dutton called the ban by Tennis Australia ‘deeply concerning’.
Earlier this week, according to the BBC, retired tennis star Martina Navratilova also blasted the T-shirt ban.