MOSCOW -- Vladimir Putin has given Russian citizenship to former world heavyweight boxing champion Roy Jones Jr.
Jones asked Putin for citizenship in August over a cup of tea when they met in Crimea -- the territory annexed by Russia last year -- saying it would make doing business in the country much easier.
Putin said it would be possible if Jones planned to spend a significant part of his life in Russia, while the boxer said he hoped sport could help "build a bridge" between the United States and Russia.
"I want to speak so well in Russian that people understand me without any problems," Jones said. "I think that'll take about a year. I hope that next year I'll already be speaking like a Russian."
Jones added that he wanted to "earn 2 or 3 billion dollars," open boxing schools in Russia and develop his rap career.
Hearing him speak Russian in a year or so would be truly surreal.
I'm sure he'll sound as funny to native Russians as Kovalev and GGG do when they speak English!
Who would ever have thought, when RJJ was the p4p king of boxing back in the 1990's, that this all American sporting hero would one day become a citizen of the "evil empire"?
Do you have a source for this?
Wow, its ****in legit :lol1:
http://espn.go.com/boxing/story/_/id/13637120/roy-jones-jr-receives-russian-citizenship-vladimir-putin