Kazakhstan angry spoof anthem played at event

[March 24, 2012]  MOSCOW (AP) -- Kazakhstan has labeled the playing of a spoof of its national anthem at an international sporting event "a scandal," and demanded a probe into the incident.

Maria Dmitrienko won a gold medal for Kazakhstan on Thursday at the Arab Shooting Championships in Kuwait, but during the awards ceremony the public address system broadcast the spoof anthem from the 2006 movie "Borat," which offended many Kazakhs by portraying the country as backwards and degenerate.

Foreign ministry spokesman Ilyas Omarov told the ITAR-Tass news agency the incident "is, of course, a scandal and demands a thorough investigation, which we intend to conduct."

ITAR-Tass reported shooting team member Oksana Stavitskaya as saying that Asian Shooting Federation President Sheikh Salman al-Sabah had apologized to the team.

[Associated Press]

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