Ahmet Öner © bild.de

German promoter Ahmet Öner has been shot down in Hamburg at 10.15pm local time on Tuesday night. The CEO of ARENA Box-Promotion was leaving the office of a business partner in Hamburg when two men fired at him three times. The assassins had waited for Öner behind his car when a security light exposed them in the dark and they started the fire. One bullet hit Öner in his left leg before he and his two companions could get back into the building to call the police. The shooters ran away. Öner had to undergo surgery only two hours after the assault. The projectile was successfully removed from his thigh. “I am okay”, stated Öner after the operation. “I have been attacked before but this was the first time somebody cowardly ambushed me in the dark to shoot at me. I hope it will be the last time as well. I know that wherever there is success in the world there is envy as well. I just cannot understand how somebody could go this far and try to kill me. This is insane.”

Originally Öner had planned to fly to New York on Wednesday for Thursday’s press conference along with Top Rank to announce the October 10th show featuring Öner’s Cuban stars Yuriorkis Gamboa and Odlanier Solis. “Maybe somebody wanted to prevent me from getting there”, said Öner. “But it is not up to me to pursue any investigations. Police will take care of it.”

According to the doctors the ARENA CEO was very lucky that the bullet only hit his thigh and didn’t even manage to break any bone. There were not complications at the surgery as well. Most probably Öner can leave the hospital in a couple of days.

“I won’t be stopped by a perfidious attack like that”, says Öner. “We will continue our work exactly as planned. Our next show will be on September 18th in Spain with Steffen Kretschmann and Mahir Oral, live on Eurosport. On October 10th we will have the big show with Top Rank at the Madison Square Garden and then we will be back in Germany on October 24th. The show must and will go on.”