Uzbekistan’s first world boxing champion and 1976 Olympic silver medalist Rufat Riskiyev has died at the age of 76 after being seriously ill in recent years, the Boxing Federation said.
Riskiyev was born in Oqqorgon in 1949 into a family of a doctor. He began boxing at the age of 12 under the guidance of renowned coach Sidney Jackson. At 14, he joined the Tashkent sports society Burevestnik. From 1966, he trained under another prominent coach Boris Granatkin.