The Hamburg Regional Court has ruled that statements made on the German TV channel ARD that businessman Alisher Usmanov had created a "system of bribing judges" for the fencing tournament at the Paris Olympics were slander. The court banned the channel from distributing such materials under threat of administrative arrest or a fine of up to €250,000 for each violation. Mr. Usmanov headed the International Fencing Federation (FIE) from 2008 to 2022 and voluntarily suspended his presidential powers due to EU sanctions.

The accusations against the businessman were made in reports by journalist Hajo Seppelt. He became famous for his scandalous sports investigations, including on doping in Russian sports. The journalist claimed that Alisher Usmanov had allegedly introduced a "system of bribing judges" into fencing, forcing them to ensure victory for the right athletes in exchange for bribes or under pressure.

The journalist's entire investigation was based on the stories of a retired FIE judge and on the episode with the fight of Georgian sabre fencer Sandro Bazadze in the 1/8 finals of the Olympic tournament, in which he lost to Egyptian Mohamed Amer. At the time, Bazadze said that he lost due to unfair refereeing. Later, his father, President of the Georgian Fencing Federation Merab Bazadze, officially apologized to the FIE and explained the fencer's words by an emotional breakdown. And the current leadership of the federation stated that the retired judge had previously failed to qualify and was excluded from the list of judges by the FIE panel of judges.

The accusations against Mr. Usmanov were reprinted by the German online publication Sport1.de and the Austrian newspaper Krone.at. However, they changed their publications at the request of the businessman's lawyers. ARD refused to correct the inaccurate statements, after which Alisher Usmanov filed a lawsuit.

Mr. Usmanov's press service emphasized that a number of European media outlets have already admitted that they cannot prove their own allegations regarding the businessman. Therefore, they have signed written commitments to stop disseminating them.