Amir Khan (born Amir Iqbal Khan on 8 December 1986), is an English professional boxer of Pakistani descent who is currently the unified IBF and WBA World Light Welterweight Champion.
Currently, Khan is rated as the best boxer in the Light Welterweight division, above Timothy Bradley; who holds the other two major titles in the division. Khan is also rated #9 and #10 pound-for-pound best boxer in the world by Boxrec and Sports Illustrated respectively.
He was previously in the Lightweight division, where he held the Commonwealth, WBO Inter-Continental and WBA International titles.
Although of relatively young age, Khan has already amassed many achievements along the way. He is the youngest British Olympic boxing medalist when he captured silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics at the age of 17. He is also one of the youngest British world champions ever, winning the WBA world title, aged only 22.
Khan began to box competitively at the age of 11, with early honours including three English school titles, three junior ABA titles, and gold at the 2003 Junior Olympics. In early 2004 he won a gold medal at the European Student Championships in Lithuania, and in South Korea several months later he won world junior lightweight title after fighting five times in seven days. One of his notable early amateur fights was against Victor Ortz, whom he defeated in a second round stoppage.
Khan qualified for the 2004 Summer Olympics by finishing in first place at the 1st AIBA European 2004 Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. He was Britain's sole representative in boxing at the Athens Games, winning a silver medal at the age of 17 in the lightweight boxing category. He was Britain's youngest Olympic boxer since Colin Jones in 1976. He lost in the final to Mario Kindelan, the Cuban who had also beaten him several months earlier in the pre-Olympic match-ups in Greece. In 2005 he avenged the two losses by beating the 34-year-old Kindelan in his last amateur fight.
Charitable and community work
- After the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, Khan assisted in helping raise 1 million for victims of the disaster. After the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, Khan went to Pakistan and handed out food parcels to children in a camp.
- In July 2006 Khan became involved in the No Messin' campaign, which promotes child safety around British railways.
- In 2008, he raised more than 6,000 for a firefighter who was badly burned while trying to save a family from an arson attack in Bolton. Khan along with a few other famous faces took part in a charity football match at Valley Parade in Bradford, the proceeds of the match went to the family of the murdered police officer Sharon Beshenivsky.
- He has spent 1 million of his own money on opening the Gloves Community Centre and boxing gym in Bolton to get youths off the streets.
- He has shown support for the White Ribbon Campaign, which encourages men to play a role in ending violence against women.
Media
- Khan was involved in a TV programme for Channel 4, Amir Khan's Angry Young Men, which consisted of three 50-minute episodes. The programme centred around troubled angry men and aimed to use the disciplines of boxing, coupled with faith and family values, to help re-focus their lives and steer them away from trouble in the future. It was screened in August/September 2007.
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