FIAS Congress held in Astana

The regular meeting of the International SAMBO Federation Congress was held on November 8 in Astana (Republic of Kazakhstan). During the event, held in a mixed offline/online format, delegates from 99 countries discussed the problems and prospects for the development of international SAMBO.

At the beginning of the meeting, the participants unanimously voted for the proposal to accept the national SAMBO federations of Honduras and Jamaica as members of FIAS.

Taking the floor, Vasily Shestakov noted the extensive experience of the Kazakhstan Federation of Sport and Combat SAMBO in holding major international competitions and expressed confidence that the 2024 World Championships will be held at a high level.

Then the head of FIAS summed up the results of the outgoing year. "Continental tournaments were organized and successfully held: the European Championships were held in Novi Sad (Serbia), the African Championships – in Cairo (Egypt), the Asia and Oceania Championships – in Macau (China), and the Pan American Championships – in Cuiaba (Brazil). I would like to thank all the leaders of the continental federations and national federations that hosted the championships for the efforts they made to hold calendar events in difficult conditions," Shestakov said.

He also noted the high significance of the World Beach SAMBO Championships in Casablanca (Morocco), the World Cadet, Youth and Junior SAMBO Championships in Larnaca (Cyprus), the World SAMBO Masters Championships in Dushanbe (Tajikistan), the World Cups in Yerevan (Armenia) and Cholpon-Ata (Kyrgyzstan), as well as the first International SAMBO Tournament organized in Yaounde (Cameroon).

"The achievements of the outgoing year include the inclusion of SAMBO as a demonstration sport in the program of the XIII African Games-2024," the FIAS leader emphasized.

Speaking about the immediate prospects, Vasily Shestakov drew the delegates' attention to the upcoming major multi-sport competitions next year: the World Games in Chengdu (China) and the Asian Youth Games in Tashkent (Uzbekistan), the program of which will include SAMBO.

Then he informed the meeting participants about the educational work of FIAS, including the successful holding of a series of coaching and refereeing seminars in different countries of the world, highlighting among them the Netherlands, Serbia, Macau, Brazil, Kyrgyzstan and Cyprus.

Informing the delegates about the coverage of FIAS activities in the media and social networks, Vasily Shestakov pointed out a noticeable increase in the number of subscribers, which in the outgoing year amounted to from 30% to 100% in various social networks. "The most popular videos have 5-10 million views. The total audience of all FIAS social networks that follow international SAMBO news daily is about 700 thousand users," the FIAS President emphasized. "According to last year's statistics provided by the world's leading TV channels, including Eurosport, the total audience of the World SAMBO Championships in Yerevan was 20 million people," Shestakov added.

In the final part of the event, congress delegates discussed the work of the FIAS commissions, approved the city of Ashgabat as the venue for the 2025 Congress, and voted to extend Vasily Shestakov's term as President of the International SAMBO Federation until 2029.