The British police announced on Thursday that they have opened an investigation into the revelations of athlete Mo Farah, who claims to have been a victim of child trafficking to enter Great Britain when he was under ten years old.
The quadruple Olympic champion in the 2012 and 2016 Games, 39 years old and of Somali origin, stated in a documentary broadcasted by the BBC this week that his real name is Hussein Abdi Kahin.
He specified that he was forced to work as a domestic employee after illegally entering Great Britain at the age of eight or nine.
"We are aware of the reports in the press about Sir Mo Farah," said the London Police Department (MPS) in a statement. Farah was knighted by the Queen in 2017.
"No information has been passed to the MPS at this time. Specialist officers have opened an investigation and are examining all available information," the statement added.
"Sports Hero"
Farah received help from his physical education teacher, Alan Watkinson, to obtain British citizenship, using the name given to him by the woman who had arranged his arrival in the country.
The British government had given assurances to the athlete on Wednesday that he would not be stripped of his British citizenship, being described by a spokesperson as a "sports hero".
Instead of arriving in Great Britain as a refugee with his mother and two of his siblings to join his father, who was already working there, as he had previously stated, Farah indicated that he had arrived from Djibouti with a woman he had never seen before, presenting himself as another child of her family.
According to revelations made to the BBC, his father had actually been killed during the civil war in Somalia when he was four years old, while his mother and two of his siblings live in the separatist region of Somaliland, not recognized by the international community.
Farah was encouraged to tell his true story by his wife and children.
"I don't really want to talk about it because I had told myself that I would never talk about it, that it would remain buried deep within me," Farah said in the documentary.
(AFP)
RPP PODCAST: Congress has dismantled the reform in the university system, denounces Flor Pablo
The legislator said that there were economic interests behind the project approved by persistence in the plenary of Parliament. On the other hand, legislator Alex Paredes, from the ruling Magisterial Bloc, justified his group's support for the persistence of the project despite the government's objections.