Paralympics: Colombian Refugee Amelio Castro Competes in Fencing
Amelio Castro in Paris 2024. Photo: @Refugees
September 6, 2024 Hour: 9:58 am
In Italy, he is developing a career as an athlete and training with the best.
The Colombian refugee Amelio Castro is competing in Paris 2024 as a member of the Refugee Paralympic Team, the largest in history with eight members. He lives in Rome and spends much of his time training with his heroes, including the wheelchair fencing icon, Bebe Vio, and Olympic champion Elisa Di Francisca.
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His debut in the Games took place in the men’s sabre event, category B. In the round of 16, he lost 15-3 to the Polish athlete Adrian Castro, but in the second round, he won a repechage match against the Ukrainian Anton Datsko. In the épée event, he won against the Hungarian Istvan Tarjanyi and lost to the Brazilian Jovane Sosten and the Chinese Daoliang Hu, bringing his participation in the Games to a close amid applause from the audience.
For Castro, sports mean “everything,” especially to alleviate the intense pain he carries with him. At sixteen, his mother was killed, and four years later, he lost the use of his legs due to a traffic accident. “After a long road to recovery, I decided to write a book to try to inspire people. Then, an idea came to me. If I could practice a sport, excel in it, and win medals, that would give me visibility and attract public attention,” he emphasizes.
He first tried wheelchair basketball but didn’t like it. When he discovered wheelchair fencing in 2017, it was love at first sight. The threats he received in Colombia forced him to seek a painful escape: exile. He moved to Italy from Colombia in 2022 and began training with coach Daniele Pantoni. He had first met Pantoni at a competition in Cali in 2018.
“When I arrived in Italy, I felt like I was in the dark. As a migrant, it was difficult to find a place to train, eat properly, and get the optimal rest that a high-performance athlete needs. Plus, I was alone. Then I met Pantoni, who has been by my side from day one, helping me train and assisting me with all my needs.”
After obtaining political asylum, he initially couldn’t compete in international competitions, but thanks to the Refugee Paralympic Team, he was able to participate in competitions around the world again. In Italy, he is developing a career as an athlete and training with the best, with those who make up the ‘Fiamme Oro,’ the national police sports group, although not everything is rosy. Currently, Castro lives in a reception center, where the conditions are not the best.
“Sometimes you can’t sleep well because there are so many people. And it’s a long journey before I get to training. It’s a two-hour trip on public transport, and sometimes there’s an elevator, and sometimes there’s not. Just like sometimes the bus helps, and other times it doesn’t,” he states.
While fulfilling his dream, Amelio Castro tries to follow a principle that he always keeps in mind: “Never give up. No matter how difficult the situation seems, you can always move forward by focusing on what has been done well and respecting others.”
Through his example, the Colombian athlete has represented the hopes and dreams of 120 million forcibly displaced people around the world, including about eighteen million people with disabilities. These athletes are, as the International Paralympic Committee says, the “emblem” of their existence.
teleSUR/ JF Source: EFE
