Zhan Beleniuk

Zhan Vensanovych Beleniuk is a Ukrainian politician and Greco-Roman wrestler. He is a three-time Olympic medalist and won the gold medal in the Greco-Roman 87 kg at the 2020 Summer Olympics, the silver medal in the Greco-Roman 85 kg at the 2016 Summer Olympics and a bronze medal in the Greco-Roman 87 kg at the 2024 Summer Olympics. Beleniuk is also a two-time world champion, a three-time European champion and a European Games champion. In 2019, he became the first black member of the Ukrainian Parliament.

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Early life

Beleniuk was born in 1991 in Kyiv to a father from Rwanda and a mother from Ukraine. His father, a Rwandan Hutu, was a pilot who studied in Kyiv at the National Aviation University and died during the Rwandan Civil War when Beleniuk was 3 years old.
Beleniuk began wrestling in 2000 when he was nine years old.

Career

In 2010, Beleniuk won the silver medal at the Junior World Championships. In 2011, he became the Junior European Champion amongst, and won bronze at the World Championship. In 2012, he won the bronze medal at the European Championships. In 2013, he won bronze again at the Summer Universiade.
In 2014, he won a gold medal at the 2014 European Wrestling Championships, and bronze at the World Championships.
In 2015, he won the silver medal at the first European Games in Azerbaijan. On 10 September 2015, after winning against the then-reigning World Champion and then-Champion of Asia, Uzbek Rustam Assakalov scoring 6:0, Beleniuk won gold at the 2015 World Wrestling Championships in the under-85 kg weight category.
In 2016, he won gold at the 2016 European Wrestling Championships, followed by the silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.
In 2021, he won the gold medal in the men's Greco-Roman 87 kg event at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
Beleniuk was briefly a member of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine. He left the National Olympic Committee in January 2023 due to disagreement with its new president Vadym Gutzeit. In 2024, Beleniuk won a bronze medal in the men's Greco-Roman 87 kg at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris and subsequently retired from competing.

Politics

Beleniuk was elected a deputy to the Verkhovna Rada in July 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election as a member of the Servant of the People political party. He was one of the first ten candidates on the party's electoral list.

International competition