Mo Farah says he was trafficked into UK

London, July 12

Four-time Olympics champion Mo Farah has disclosed he was brought into Britain illegally from Djibouti under the name of another child.

“The truth is I’m not who you think I am,” the 39-year-old Farah told the BBC in a documentary.

Farah, who became the first British track and field athlete to win four Olympics gold medals, said his children have motivated him to be truthful about his past.

“The real story is I was born in Somaliland, north of Somalia, as Hussein Abdi Kahin,” he said. “Despite what I’ve said in the past, my parents never lived in the UK. When I was four my dad was killed in the civil war, you know as a family we were torn apart. I was separated from my mother, and I was brought into the UK illegally under the name of another child called Mohamed Farah.”

During the documentary, Farah said he thought he was going to Europe to live with relatives and recalled going through a British passport check under the guise of Mohamed at the age of nine after travelling with a woman he didn’t previously know.

“I had all the contact details for my relative and once we got to her house, the lady took it off me and right in front of me ripped them up and put it in the bin and at that moment I knew I was in trouble,” he said. — AP