Shamil Tarpischev should not be considered a modern man. He was born in 1948 and spent 43 years as a citizen of the Soviet Union before that oppressive polity collapsed. He played tennis, coached it and currently is president of the Russian tennis federation.
Being 66 and a Russian male does not excuse his infamous “Williams brothers” statement, but it helps explain it.
The dominance of the Williams sisters, Serena and Venus, has been “scary” to many women in the sport, presumably including Russia’s many elite players, for most of two decades, during which Serena and Venus won 25 grand slam championships.
Several of Tarpischev’s female compatriots would have had more impressive careers (to the glory of his Russian federation) if not for the sisters. Serena beat Dinara Safina in the 2007 Australia Open final and Vera Zvonareva in the 2012 Wimbledon final. Neither Russian woman won a major. Serena twice beat Maria Sharapova in slam finals, and for the 2012 Olympic gold. Venus also kept a Russian woman from a major title, the 2000 Olympic gold, when she beat Elena Dementieva.
Tarpischev’s puzzlement over his one-year ban this week might be genuine. Soviet Man was not a progressive creature, especially in his latter years, and the notion of what is appropriate comment may not have percolated to his side of what was the Iron Curtain. Consider, too, the persistence of racial abuse at football matches in Russia. Tracts of Russian society have not yet arrived in 2014.
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Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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Universal Championship Brock Lesnar (champion) v Roman Reigns in a steel cage match
WWE World Heavyweight ChampionshipAJ Styles (champion) v Shinsuke Nakamura
Intercontinental Championship Seth Rollins (champion) v The Miz v Finn Balor v Samoa Joe
United States Championship Jeff Hardy (champion) v Jinder Mahal
SmackDown Tag Team Championship The Bludgeon Brothers (champions) v The Usos
Raw Tag Team Championship (currently vacant) Cesaro and Sheamus v Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt
Casket match The Undertaker v Rusev
Singles match John Cena v Triple H
Cruiserweight Championship Cedric Alexander v Kalisto
