WTA chief Steve Simon confirms the WTA hasn’t received any assurances from China regarding their request to properly request Peng Shuai’s se*ual assault claims. In 2021 November, Peng accused a former Chinese Vice Premier of se*ual assault.
Peng disappeared after making the allegations, which prompted the WTA to suspend all China events in 2022. In an interview conducted with L’Equipe in February, Peng claimed she was fine, never made any se*ual assault allegations, never disappeared and that she had to end her career.
The interview happened on Chinese soil and the WTA suspected that Peng was forced to make such statements.
Simon the Peng case
“We do need to resolve Peng. We’re comfortable that she’s safe, and we know she’s in Beijing, which is great.
We want that. But we haven’t received the assurances that we want with respect to the investigation that we requested. What’s the real story? That’s all we’ve asked for. What’s the story? She obviously had great courage to come forward with what she said.
The principles that are involved are right in line with what we stand for as an organization. And what we’ve asked for is an investigation to understand what occurred, what didn’t occur, and then address it appropriately,” Simon told The Associated Press.
Also, Simon addresses Simona Halep failing a doping test. “I believe her that she didn’t intentionally do something here. That being said, I do believe very strongly in our anti-doping program, and I think it’s a good one, and our players support it, too.
And if you ask Simona, she supports it. I’m very confident that as we go through the process, the truth is going to come out, and we will deal with it accordingly. But I have a lot of sympathy for Simona, because I would never question her integrity,” Simon said of Halep failing a doping test.
