A Japanese sports official, who also serves as vice president of the Japan Olympic Committee (JOC), used a racial slur against Koreans and made personal attacks during an internal federation meeting in February. The remarks were reported on May 11 by Japanese outlet Slow News and are now drawing criticism.
Takahiro Kitano, chairman of the Japan Bobsleigh, Luge and Skeleton Federation, made the comments at a meeting held shortly after Japan’s men’s bobsled team missed qualification for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics due to an administrative error on the federation’s side.
According to the report, a director identified only as “A,” who was in charge of competitive performance at the time, proposed reforms to the athlete and team support system. Kitano shut him down with personal attacks: “You analyzed nothing. You had no plan. You should be ashamed to be in sports.”
He then said, in effect, that “looking at results and analyzing them is something any idiot or chon can do.” The word he used, チョン (chon, 조센징), is a Japanese ethnic slur for Koreans, both ethnic Koreans in Japan (Zainichi) and Koreans generally. It’s widely recognized in Japan as derogatory and is not the kind of word that gets said in a professional meeting by accident.
Kitano had visited Korea just last month, meeting with the 2018 PyeongChang Memorial Foundation to discuss expanded cooperation around the PyeongChang Sliding Centre. But federation insiders say he has long made his hostility toward Korea clear internally, frequently saying “Korea cannot be trusted.” At the February meeting, when A suggested strengthening ties with Korea and other Asian countries as a way forward, Kitano reportedly dismissed it outright.
Back in 2020, when COVID-19 forced the federation to cancel its annual European training camps, training in Korea was floated as an alternative. That plan was also reportedly killed by Kitano.
Kitano has chaired the federation since 2012, now 14 years running. The federation’s own bylaws cap the term at 12 years, but he has remained in place without explanation. He concurrently serves as a vice president of the JOC.
Reaction inside Japanese sports circles has been pointed, with some saying the behavior “runs counter to the JOC’s historical role in advancing winter sports across Asia” and that “rather than taking responsibility for the federation’s Olympic qualification failure, the chairman is privatizing the organization through discriminatory remarks.”
Neither the federation nor the JOC has issued an official statement.
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