Cuba might skip the World Boxing Championships in Chicago so as not to deliver "fresh flesh" to unscrupulous promoters, Cuban leader Fidel Castro said on Wednesday following a defection attempt by two top Cuban boxers.

"Sports authorities are analyzing all possible scenarios, including changing the list of boxers or not sending any delegation at all," Castro said in an article published by Cuba's state-run dailies.

The statement came just days after double Olympic and world bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux, 25, and world welterweight champion Erislandy Lara, 24, tried to defect.

The two were arrested in Brazil on Friday and put on a flight to Cuba. A police chief in Brazil said the Cubans were "happy to return" to the communist-run island.

Castro called the boxers "traitors" for trying to defect, and said they would never compete for Cuba again.

German boxing promoters had reportedly tried to hire the two during last month's Pan-American Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Castro said the October meet in Chicago will again feature "sharks of the mafia seeking fresh flesh."
"We are not keen to deliver them to their doorstep," Castro wrote.

Castro, who has written 35 newspaper articles while convalescing from gastro-intestinal surgery he underwent in July 2006, has lashed out on several occasions against what he calls the theft of developing nations' sporting and scientific talent by industrialized nations.

Source: CaribbeanNetNews