Three years ago, Zakia Khudadadi was hiding from the Taliban, training in secret in her back garden at home in Afghanistan. Today, she is a bronze medalist and just made history as the first athlete from the Refugee Paralympic Team to win a medal at the Paralympics.
On Thursday at the Grand Palais in Paris, the 25-year-old defeated Turkey’s Nurcihan Ekinci in their match to claim bronze in the taekwondo women’s 47g category. After losing in the quarterfinals, Khudadadi emerged victorious in her makeup match to claim a place on the podium when Morocco’s Naoual Laarif withdrew from the bronze medal competition.
“It was a surreal moment, my heart started racing when I realized I had won the bronze,” Khudadadi told AP News. “I went through so much to get here. This medal is for all the women of Afghanistan and all the refugees of the world. I hope that one day there will be peace in my country.”
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Khudadadi was born without one forearm and began practicing taekwondo in secret at a hidden gym in Herat, Afghanistan, when she was 11 years old.
Following the rise of the Taliban in 2021, Khudadadi was blocked from competing in the sport she loves. According to CNN, she was unable to leave the country at first and was forced into hiding, continuing to train for the Paralympics in secret from her back garden. In a moment of desperation, Khudadadi released a video plea that went viral. Eventually, she was granted a place on Spain’s evacuee list and airlifted to safety by the Australian Air Force.
“I was told that, if I stayed, the Taliban would come and take me because I was a female athlete disobeying their rules,” she told CNN. “I had only one choice—to leave.”