Vasily Shestakov: interview on the occasion of his birthday

Vasily Shestakov, President of FIAS, turned 59 on April, 4. On his birthday, the leader of the International SAMBO Federation told the ITAR-TASS correspondent about the development of SAMBO and about the most important activities of the Federation at the moment. FIAS Journalist Pool /By ITAR-TASS correspondent/ ITAR-TASS 04.04.2012 20:16:43 SAMBO - RUSSIA - PRESIDENT SPORT: SAMBO - RUSSIA - PRESIDENT - SHESTAKOV SAMBO returns to schools and uniform services and strives to be included in the program of the Olympic Games. MOSCOW, April 4. /By ITAR-TASS Correspondent Yury Davydov-Zavada/. Promotion of SAMBO in the World has been a bottleneck in our work for a long time. Vasily Shestakov, President of the International SAMBO Federation /FIAS/ who has his birthday today told about this to the Correspondent of ITAR-TASS. "At the Congress of AIPS, the President of this organization and I agreed to create a Working Comission who would take care of the promotion of SAMBO. We provide them with literature and videos, etc., and they distribute them around the globe. Thus, we organized translations of the last SAMBO World Championships in 15 countries, each of them a half hour of live transmission. "A. Kharlampiev Memorial" that was held in Moscow not long ago will be shown, too. By the way, this is closely connected with another important question: the struggle for the inclusion of SAMBO in the program of the Olympic Games. Now, about 83 countries support this martial art. Thanks to Fedor Emelianenko and Oleg Taktarov, we are well known in Asia, in Korea, Japan, and in the South America. In Europe, things are a little worse... Anyway, we would not refuse the official status of an Olympic sport. It is a worthy goal, and we keep working at it", said the President. "Nowadays, we are trying to attract as many people as possible to our sport to make local federations stronger. Of course, we should introduce SAMBO into the school program as a part of physical education. This has been done in Moscow, and will be implemented throughout Russia. This sport stimulates and disciplines the young people like no other, and gives them the excellent physical training they need. Another important topic is the uniformed structures. I met with the heads of some agencies, and we agreed that the special training of their officers would be carried out according to the program of SAMBO. Not hand-to-hand fighting, not taekwondo, not karate, but SAMBO! This is one of the most important points of returning to our national and very effective sport", concluded Vasily Shestakov.