Maradona Accused of Sexually Harassing Russian Journalist

Maradona Accused of Sexually Harassing Russian Journalist

Football legend Diego Maradona is in the spotlight after a Russian journalist filed a formal complaint against accusing him of forcibly removing her dress during an interview.

Maradona, 56, was in Russia for the final of the Fifa Confederation Cup won by Germany on Sunday.

He has denied the claim, with his aides alleging that the reporter, 30-year-old Ekaterina Nadolskaya, “started undressing herself” prompting him to call hotel security in St Petersburg.

But the journalist gives a completely different account of the encounter, saying she’d been in the lobby bar of his hotel when they started talking, The Sun writes.

“I asked him for an interview. He invited me to his room,” she said, adding that she was with a female friend who later left.

“Maradona shut the door, and first starting answering my questions and then began harassing me,” she said.

He forced off her dress and she “managed to stop the harassment only when she was in her underwear,” reported newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda.

“I got scared and threatened him I would call the police. In turn, he called the hotel security service.

“Three people carried me to the corridor. My belongings were left in the room. My phone was taken and not returned till three hours later.”

The journalist, who worked for SM News, claimed that Maradona’s assistant later came and threw 500 dollars at her, but she refused to leave without being accompanied by the police.

“I am sorry that Maradona acted the way he did, it’s not worthy of a man.

“What he did can be seen on the CCTV footage,” she said.

The unnamed hotel has played down the problem to the Russian media, claiming the night was “quiet”.