Iranian Saeid Mollaei just wants to be a judoka and an athlete. He’s had to fight a long time for that status and in Tokyo rewarded himself with a silver medal. His story begins and ends in the Budokan.

The Nippon Budokan is known as the spiritual home of Japanese martial arts - especially judo. The sport made its Olympic debut here at the first Tokyo Games in 1964. The octagonal main hall in Kitanomaru Park is modeled after the Horyu-ji temple in Mara and conveys an air of power and tranquility.

For judoka Saeid Mollaei, it is a very special place. "I want to dedicate this medal to myself first and foremost. Then to my family and then to all those who have supported me," the newly crowned Olympic silver medalist told Deutsche Welle at the press conference. The Iranian had fought his way to the final in the 81 kilogram weight category over the course of four bouts, but couldn’t get the better of home favorite Takanori Nagase of Japan.

Why did Mollaei not compete against Israeli athletes?

The Budokan, where some 11,000 spectators were expected to cheer on the judokas during the Olympic Games, is familiar territory for Mallaei. After all, it is where he lost the semifinals at the World Championships as the reigning champion two years ago - a defeat that would change his life.

Mollaei's coach received a call earlier that day from Iran's deputy sports minister with clear instructions: Mollaei was not to advance, he might eventually face an Israeli opponent in Sagi Muki during the competition. For decades, Iran has forbidden its athletes from competing against athletes from Israel because it does not recognize the country as a state. However, Mollaei continued to fight and defeated his next opponent as well.

Then, shortly before the semifinals, a staff member from the Iranian Embassy approached Mollaei in the warm-up hall and told him that security forces were at his parents' house. The judoka secured his passport, took to the mat and narrowly lost to Belgium's Matthias Casse - a final against Muki was averted. "You're supposed to be brave in life. But a thousand questions went through my head. What will happen to me or my family? So I listened to the order," Mollaei later admitted. The world title was won by Israel’s Muki.

Why is Mollaei competing for Mongolia?

On Instagram, Mollaei congratulated his successor. In Israel, he is celebrated for this gesture. "Thank you, Saeid. You are an inspiration as a person and as an athlete," Muki responded. The Ayatollah regime reacted angrily though and, after the World Championships, Mollaei departed for Germany. His dream of Olympic gold thus looked dead, because his home country would never again nominate him for a tournament.

The International Judo Federation (IFJ) supported Mollaei in his goal to compete at the Olympic Games - either in the refugee team or as an athlete of another flag. Mollaei accepted the offer of Mongolian President Chaltmaagiin Battulga to compete for the Central Asian state in the future. Asked about the Tokyo Olympics, Mollaei said, "I will come back and reclaim my right."

Why is the Budokan important to Mollaei?

In February, he traveled to Israel to compete in the Grand Slam tournament. This made him the first athlete from Iran to compete in a tournament hosted in Israel since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Although Mollaei now also holds a Mongolian passport, Iranian law states that Iranian citizenship cannot be renounced. For Mollaei, it was nevertheless liberating. "I am very happy. Now I am like any other athlete. I am free, no problems, no politics - just an athlete." He also spent the last two months before the Olympics in Israel, training with world number six Muki, with whom he is now close friends.

Now back in Tokyo, Mollaei’s story comes full circle at the place where it began, the Nippon Budokan. In the semifinal he would have met Muki, but the latter had lost a round earlier. Mollaei made it to the final and went on to win the Olympic silver medal. "I've been through a lot, I can't see my family. But now, after two years of hard work, I'm back here," Mollaei explained when asked by DW. "Because I never really said goodbye to this place."

China and Mongolia stressed opposing politicizing the issue of tracing COVID-19 origins and agreed to deepen cooperation in the fields of mining, energy, finance, agriculture, husbandry and infrastructure construction, and innovate new forms and contents of people-to-people exchanges.

The consensus was reached during a meeting between Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and the visiting Mongolian Foreign Minister Batmunkh Battsetseg in north China's Tianjin Municipality on Tuesday.

Anti-epidemic cooperation

Wang said China and Mongolia have supported and helped each other since the outbreak of COVID-19, writing a new chapter of bilateral friendship, and China is ready to continue providing Mongolia with necessary help in fighting the epidemic.

Moreover, the two sides welcomed the WHO-China joint report on the global tracing of COVID-19 origins, stressing that origin tracing is scientific work and should not be politicized. They also called on the WHO Secretariat to cooperate with member states in accordance with relevant resolutions of the World Health Assembly to promote global origin tracing research.

Following the talks, the two foreign ministers jointly met the press and issued a statement on further strengthening anti-epidemic cooperation.

Comprehensive strategic partnership

To upgrade bilateral practical cooperation, the two sides agreed to further align the Belt and Road Initiative with the Grassland Road initiative of Mongolia and strive to achieve the bilateral trade target of $10 billion at an early date.

In terms of strengthening cooperation within multilateral frameworks such as the United Nations, they vowed to jointly oppose unilateralism, support multilateralism, oppose separatism and confrontation, and support win-win cooperation, to build a community with a shared future for mankind.

China also invited Mongolian leaders to attend the 2021 Taiyuan Energy Low Carbon Development Forum online, and welcomed Prime Minister Oyun Erden and Gombojav Zandanshatar, parliamentary speaker, to visit China at an appropriate time.

Battsetseg expressed the willingness to work with China to enrich the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries.

Mongolia will not participate in any country-specific mechanism, she said.

Noting that Tibet is an inalienable part of China's territory, the Mongolian foreign minister stressed that Tibet-related issues are China's internal affairs and Mongolia will not let the Tibet-related issues interfere with the development of bilateral relations.

Mongolia supports the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and wishes the sports event a complete success, she said.

She also said Mongolia is willing to work with China to advance Mongolia-China-Russia trilateral cooperation.

Daily COVID-19 press briefing for today, July 28, by the Ministry of Health reported that 1,234 new coronavirus cases were detected in the past 24 hours after tests were carried out at PCR laboratories across the country.

In specific, 511 new cases were confirmed in Ulaanbaatar city, and 732 cases were detected in rural regions.

As a result, the nationwide infection tally is now 160,344. In the last 24 hours, 2,100 coronavirus patients were recovered and discharged from hospital.

The Ministry also reported seven new COVID-19 related deaths, raising the country's death toll to 796.

As a result of the quick action taken by the Government of Mongolia, 60.1 percent of the total population or 1,956,183 people have been fully vaccinated as of today on July 28.

66.2 percent or 2,155,040 people have been administered with the first dose of COVID-19 vaccines, reported the Ministry of Health.

With Maldives currently leading the global vaccination initiative during this time where COVID-19 vaccine supply continues to be an issue for some countries, Mongolia is currently placed 13th for its percentage of fully vaccinated population.

Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary Péter Szijjártó will pay a working visit to Mongolia on July 29, Thursday, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia.

During the visit, medical equipment provided by the government of Hungary as humanitarian assistance to Mongolia will be handed over.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia B.Battsetseg will receive Hungarian delegates headed by Minister Péter Szijjártó. Moreover, the Hungarian Minister will pay a courtesy call on Speaker of the State Great Khural of Mongolia G.Zandanshatar and will hold bilateral meetings with Ministers of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry and Justice and Internal Affairs of Mongolia.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia B.Battsetseg, during her visit to the People's Republic of China on July 27, held official talks with State Councilor and Foreign Minister of the People's Republic of China Wang Yi in Tianjin city. The official talks touched on a wide range of issues on Mongolia-China bilateral relations and regional and international cooperation.

Agreeing that political mutual understanding and strengthening of trust enable further growth of cooperation in all possible fields, the two foreign ministers highlighted that the heads of the two states as well as the parliamentarian and government authorities have agreed on many important issues to develop the bilateral ties during their telephone conversations.

Ministers Battsetseg and Wang Yi also agreed to carry out the visits by Speaker of Mongolia’s State Great Khural and Prime Minister as soon as the pandemic subsides and organize the meetings for inter-parliamentarian regular mechanism talks and inter-foreign ministry strategic mechanism in proper formats. The meeting also emphasized the active partnership being maintained by the two countries amid the challenging situation posed by COVID-19 as an example of efforts against the pandemic.

The ministers agreed to boost their cooperation against the COVID-19 pandemic, issuing a joint statement on strengthening cooperation to fight against the pandemic. The joint statement sets out to take measures against the pandemic, move up the efforts to restore the economic and trade cooperation and increase trade turnover and freight transportation volume by fully utilizing the green channel regime established at the Mongolia-China border checkpoints.

The sides further affirmed to intensify the strives to implement their development policies, bring about large scale projects and programs in various fields, such as minerals, energy, agriculture, infrastructure and environment and increase trade turnover to USD 10 billion in the near future.

Both ministers pledged to cooperate in increasing traffic flows at bordering checkpoints Zamiin-Uud-Erlian, Gashuunsukhait-Gantsmod and Shiveekhuren-Sekhee with the help of measures against the coronavirus infections, establishing long-term coal purchase contract under commercial terms, increasing Mongolia’s coal exports to China through introducing new types of transportation and expanding Mongolia’s agricultural exports and speed up meat exports from Mongolia’s western region. A regular meeting of the Mongolia-China joint council on mineral resources, energy and infrastructure cooperation was scheduled in the third quarter of this year.

Ministers Battsetseg and Wang Yi then concurred that corresponding organizations from the two countries will pay attention on accelerating the projects underway in Mongolia with China’s soft loan and grants and tackling any challenges caused by the pandemic situation.

During the meeting, the sides also agreed collaborate on projects aimed at tackling desertification and dust storms as discussed by the presidents of Mongolia and China earlier this month in their telephone conversation and expressed their eagerness to keep cultural, education and humanitarian partnership normal amid the pandemic circumstances.

Confirming that both Mongolia and China attach great importance to the development of trilateral cooperation of Mongolia, Russia and China, the sides vowed to provide support to entities from the three countries in order to bring forward the building of trilateral economic corridor and the development of feasibility study for the Russia-China gas pipeline to transit through Mongolia.

During the official talks, the Mongolian and Chinese ministers exchanged views on regional and international matters of mutual concern as well and pledged to continue their close and friendly relations.

Prime Minister of Mongolia L.Oyun-Erdene held a working meeting with the Prime Minister of the Republic of Korea Kim Bu-gyom today.

Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene expressed commitment to upgrade the current ‘Comprehensive Partnership’ between Mongolia and the Republic of Korea to ‘Strategic Partnership', increase the frequency of high-level reciprocal visits as soon as the risk of the pandemic subsides, and economic cooperation and advance trade and investment to a new level.

The two sides agreed on the importance of close cooperation in the current difficult situation of the COVID-19 pandemic, and agreed to work more closely to share knowledge, experience and information aimed at overcoming the pandemic. Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene thanked the Government of the Republic of Korea for its support and assistance in repatriating Mongolian citizens, conducting charter flights and combating the pandemic, and noted that two sides will continue to work closely to promote people-to-people exchanges. He also asked the Government of the Republic of Korea to support the protection of Mongolians living in the Republic of Korea amid the pandemic and ensure that they are immunized.

Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene was informed on the South Korea’s measures and policies on the coordination of the school activities, COVID-19 treatments and economic recovery. They also touched upon the current situation of the pandemic in the two countries, spread of the delta variant in the ROK, the effectiveness of vaccine immunization and COVID-19 treatment.

Congratulating the people of Mongolia on the 100th anniversary of the People’s Revolution, Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum shared his memories of visiting Mongolia six years ago to experience the beautiful nature. He said that he wishes more South Korean tourists to visit and explore Mongolia.

Moreover, Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum thanked the Government of Mongolia for supporting the Northeast Asia Cooperation Initiative for Infectious Disease Control and Public Health, and the New Northern Policy proposed by the ROK. He then expressed his desire to further strengthen the regional and bilateral cooperation in the fields of infection control and health, and intensify cooperation in the fields of transportation, energy and logistics.

Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene also exchanged views on increasing investment and joint implementation of major development projects and programs within the framework of the regional initiative proposed by the Republic of Korea.

At the end of the meeting, the Prime Ministers agreed to deepen cooperation in the international and regional arenas, especially in the field of peace and security in Northeast Asia.

Following the meeting, Prime Minister L.Oyun-Erdene is scheduled to hold a meeting with the President of EXIM Bank of the Republic of Korea and representatives of infrastructure investment corporations.

The directors of Avant Cashmere and Hero Cashmere are in Milan this week discussing plans for their next collaborations. In spite of Covid-19, the two have managed to come together in the Italian fashion capital to work on some creative projects. Keep an eye on these two promising brands over the coming months.

Both Tuul and Carrie are grateful to MBD www.mongolianbusinessdatabase.com and Serod Ichinkhorloo for excellent advisory services in doing business across borders.”

In the Tokyo Olympics, Iranian-born judoka Saeid Mollaei has won the silver medal in the men's 81-kilogram category.

He's representing Mongolia at the Games after a long-running diplomatic row.

Mollaei lost to Japan's Nagase Takanori in the final match on Tuesday evening.

In the background is his claim that he was pressured by Iranian authorities to withdraw from the World Championships in 2019, to avoid the possibility of a match against an Israeli opponent.

Tehran does not recognize Israel as a state.

The sport's governing body responded by disqualifying Iran's judo federation. Mollaei competed as a refugee instead and eventually acquired Mongolian citizenship.

Twenty-nine athletes are competing in Tokyo on the Refugee Olympic Team. They say they want to send a message of hope to refugees around the world.

Refugee Olympic Team's Rose Nathike Lokonyen said, "We are all human beings, and we can do what others are doing as well. Because no one chooses to be refugees."

Another athlete from South Sudan said he wants to raise awareness and increase support for displaced people through the team's performance.

This is the second time the International Olympic Committee has formed a refugee team, following Rio in 2016.

JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska – Although they didn’t know it when they left their home state in the heat of the pandemic seven months ago, Alaska Army National Guard Capt. Jessica Miller, a registered nurse with the Medical Detachment, and Sgt. 1st Class Juan Restrepo, a logistician in Joint Force Headquarters, were the last rotation of Alaska National Guard liaisons accompanying the Mongolian Expeditionary Task Force to Afghanistan. They flew home to Alaska July 21, ending the mission that began 18 years ago.

Alaska and Mongolia formalized their partnership in 2003 under the National Guard State Partnership Program. Shortly afterward, the Mongolian Armed Forces deployed troops to the Polish base, Camp Charlie, in Al Hillah, Iraq, as part of the multinational security force supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom. After seeing the Illinois National Guard liaisons embedded with their Polish counterparts, the MAF asked the Alaska National Guard to send support in the same manner.

Retired Lt. Col. Steve Wilson departed Alaska for a one-year tour in Iraq in 2004 on the first advising team to support the MAF’s request for AKNG liaisons. This spurred a continual annual rotation of AKNG and MAF deployed together, which would grow to be the longest forward-deployed operational partnership of any State Partnership Program.

“The mission was to advise and assist the Mongolian commander and his expeditionary forces in all interactions with U.S. forces and other coalition units,” said Wilson. “We would help advise mostly in operations and logistics.”

Embedding with the MAF in Iraq optimized their integration with U.S. and coalition forces supporting security operations, Wilson said. It also helped highlight their valuable support to the coalition operations.

“I think it reassured the Mongolians that because we had American Soldiers embedded in that unit, that we were solving the problems of Iraqi security together as one team,” said Wilson.

Five years later, in 2009, the MAF transitioned their troops from Iraq to Afghanistan, and the Alaska Army National Guard liaisons followed.

One member of the first team in Afghanistan was Brig. Gen. Wayne Don, director of Joint Staff for the Alaska National Guard. Being the first liaison team transitioning to the new country brought some challenges.

“Any time you bring a bunch of militaries together as part of a coalition, there can be some logistical and resourcing challenges,” Don said. “Initially, one of the biggest challenges for us over there was getting ammunition for the type of equipment they had.

“We eventually got it figured out,” Don said. “The Mongolians in Iraq were on a Polish base and did such a great job over there. The Polish have like ammo for their equipment, and because they felt such gratitude and affection for the Mongolians and their efforts in Iraq, they actually found a bunch of extra ammunition to provide for them.”

Don said it was relationships like those that helped foster the functioning of the coalition.

“As a participating country, the Mongolians put a condition on their participation that we had to go with them, which is a tremendous nod to the trust within our relationship, both in our countries and our militaries,” said Don. “I don’t recall seeing other participating countries that had that similar relationship.”

For the next decade, the Alaska Army National Guard continued to send liaison teams of one noncommissioned officer and an officer to assist and advise the MAF in the global war on terrorism in Afghanistan.

Finally, in November, Miller and Restrepo embarked on their mission overseas as liaisons. But this rotation did not look like the previous ones for many reasons.

“Our mission first was to make sure that the Mongolians had all of the supplies that they needed: hand sanitizer, PPE, masks, wipes, and stuff like that,” said Miller. “They were the security forces on New Kabul Compound where we were stationed, so they came into contact with Afghans, the British, the Scottish, the Danes, lots of different people. So, we had to make sure they were fully protected.”

In addition to the challenges brought on by COVID-19 of finding limited resources, Miller and Restrepo started to see New Kabul Compound dwindle in numbers of personnel as the camp was shutting down.

“From December to April, lots of people were still going home, so we saw a shortage of personnel as well as resources,” said Miller. “We actually didn’t find out until about April that we were closing the camp.”

The Mongolian soldiers returned to their home country the first week of June.

“We coordinated with the U.S. Embassy and the general staff in Mongolia to get all of their cargo that they’ve had ever since they started supporting the mission in Afghanistan,” said Miller. “They had quite a bit of gear.”

Additionally, Miller and Restrepo were responsible for coordinating the MAF flights back to Mongolia, COVID-19 testing, and ensuring that all cargo and personnel made it back smoothly.

“It’s extremely humbling [to be the final rotation],” said Miller. “I’m very, very grateful that I was chosen for this mission. The impact that Alaska has had with Mongolia is very positive, and I think that this mission was very significant in strengthening that relationship.”

After 18 continuous years, what started out as a professional partnership for many has grown into something lasting. And the partnership continues.

“The partnership originally began as a strong relationship, which eventually evolved into a friendship,” said Wilson, “So, connections were made, and I still keep in correspondence with my Mongolian friends that I deployed with to Iraq in 2004 and 2005.”