Kurdish Leader Calls for the Elimination of Ladenite Ansar Al-Islam.

Boxing a natural for Kurd

London Free Press

By JIM KERNAGHAN 
Aug 9, 2002

Adnan Shahkaram was pretty thrilled the day he shook Saddam Hussein's hand.

What nine-year-old wouldn't be? Here was the Iraqi strongman coming out of a helicopter throwing candy to Shahkaram and other Kurdish kids in a goodwill mission to their rebellious northern region.

Later, the Iraqi military would be throwing other things at the helpless Kurds, like canisters of poison gas that would kill thousands of men, women and children.

Shahkaram, now London's leading heavyweight boxer, wouldn't shake Saddam's hand today. He might tear it off and stuff it down his throat.

"I would kill him," the 220-pound boxer said.

Aside from that ominous vow, Shahkaram is ideally suited for boxing even though, at 27, he is a late arrival to it. He's been a member of the All Nations Club for just over a year now but in that span has racked up 11 straight wins, nine by knockout.

While boxing often is a means of expression for the ghetto kid, it provides an avenue of self-realization for plenty of others, too. To a Kurd, it's a natural.

Considering Kurdistan's past "teammates," taking up a solo sport featuring plenty of self-determination is an attractive option.

Double-crossed repeatedly over the years by the U.S., Britain and Turkey, it hardly is a surprise the autonomous region is wary of aiding the U.S. in its current threats to invade Iraq. It was U.S. air power, after all, that observed from a distance, but didn't intervene, when Saddam unleashed clouds of poison gas on innocent civilians.

None of this is lost on Shahkaram. When he enters the ring, he doesn't have to rely on anyone but himself and, as his knockout record suggests, he can dictate the outcome whatever the judging conditions happen to be.

Folks at the Western Fair Slots boxing card Tuesday night got only a glimpse of the raw potential. Shahkaram boxed Mike Ghafari, who happens to be his main All Nations sparring partner, and while both showed their array of combination punches and feints, their exhibition bout was virtually in slow motion.

Shahkaram showed a good measure of ring generalship and movement, though, and the sheathed power was unmistakable. His explanation for the virtual shadow-box was simple.

"Mike is the only one who can take my punches." In other words, why unload on one's principal training aid?

But he tees off on everyone else. Trainer Rob Bourgeois is continually in awe of his punching power, if not his dedication to training.

Fatigue from his factory job handling heavy panes of glass, a toothache, something often crops up to preclude training and only the threat of not being on the next card and fighting for real gets him back into the grind.

After narrowly escaping one of Iraq's lethal gas attacks, Shahkaram's family moved to Syria. There he got work loading 100-kilogram bales of cotton onto trucks.

"Sometimes, when they were wet, they'd be twice that weight and we'd lift them with hooks, me on one side and two men on the other, seven metres up a ramp into a truck," he said. "That's how I got so strong in the legs."

The youngest of a family of six boys and three girls, he moved to Canada with most of his family, following a married brother here. Other family members live in Holland, Austria and Sweden. He hasn't been back to the Middle East. One day, he says.

For now, his goals include becoming Canadian champion and then making the Olympic team. Which could set up an interesting scenario.

What if he runs into an Iraqi opponent?