Novak Djokovic admitted today that he made “mistakes” in filling out the application form for entry to Australia and in his behavior after testing positive for Covid-19 in December – as reported by Askanews – while his participation is still pending at the Australian Open.
In a message posted on Instagram, the unvaccinated world tennis number one said his team has provided further information to the Australian authorities, who must decide on whether to cancel his visa and expel him.
“We live in difficult times in a global pandemic and mistakes sometimes happen,” said Djokovic, who has been training for the Australian Open since Monday. Djokovic was seen in public in Belgrade the day after December 16, when he tested positive for Covid according to information provided to Australian immigration officials.
Claiming to be the victim of a “misinformation” that he considers “very painful” for his family, he explained that he had not yet received the results of his test, carried out the day before, when he appeared in public on December 17.
“I had no symptoms and I felt fine and I did not receive the notification of the positive PCR test until the end of this event,” he explained, before recognizing instead an “error of judgment”, that of having received, then asymptomatic patient, journalists of the French newspaper L’Equipe for an interview.
“I felt compelled to continue doing the interview with L’Equipe because I didn’t want to disappoint the reporter, but I made sure to respect social distancing and to wear a mask, except when a photo was taken,” he explained. . “Looking back, it was a mistake in judgment and I admit that I should have postponed this appointment.”
Djokovic therefore also admitted a “human error”, that of having ticked the wrong box on the form for entry to Australia. The Australian media have amply shown the player checking the box with which he confirms that he did not travel abroad in the 14 days before arriving in Australia on January 5, despite having been in Serbia and then in Spain during these two weeks.
This statement “was presented by my team on my behalf,” Djokovic wrote on Instagram. “My agent sincerely apologizes for this administrative error in ticking the wrong box relating to my travels prior to my arrival in Australia.” “It was a human error and certainly not intentional,” added Djokovic. Media Australia,
Novak Djokovic could face up to five years in prison in Australia. According to The Sunday Morning Herald and The Age, the country’s authorities are analyzing the discrepancies in the information provided by the Serbian tennis player, who admitted among other things that he had made an incorrect travel declaration for the country through a member of his staff. entry into Australia and violating Covid isolation in Serbia. The maximum penalty for those who provide false evidence, the media emphasize, is a sentence of five years.
“We can reveal that the Department of Internal Affairs investigation into the tennis star has been expanded to include his violation of Serbia’s isolation rules, misrepresentations on the Australian entry form relating to travel and inconsistencies as to his date of departure. test for Covid-19 “, write the Australian newspapers. Der Spiegel, possible tampering on positive
test The positive test at Covid by the Serbian tennis player, dated 16 December and presented to the Australian authorities for exemption, would not date back to that day. This is what the German newspaper ‘Der Spiegel’ reports, which carried out its own investigation through the computer investigators Zerforschung.
The test of that day has a specific progressive number and in the documents released it is indicated that the result was obtained around 20. Normally, the insertion in the database, writes the German newspaper, is almost immediate so as to generate a progressive numbering. But the ‘timestamp’ of the positive buffer gives a very different result: December 26th at 14.21. That is, ten days after Djokovic and his lawyers reported the day of the infection.
The positive swab of December 16 has in fact a higher identification number than that of December 26, smaller than 51 units when instead it should have been higher by law. The number factor is therefore the one where most of the problem is concentrated.
The investigators would then have reported that in the period from 22 to 26 December, the total calculation of tests carried out is of only one unit. And the timestamp detected in the buffer seems to refer to December 26th.
