Scores of athletes at the Beijing Olympics have swapped passports during their lives, sometimes with the sole objective of competing at the Games.
Here are just a few of the sporting "defectors".
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BECKY HAMMON
Born in the United States, she will represent Russia in the basketball tournament.
She has no ancestral link to Russia, but received a passport after she signed a four-year deal last year worth $2 million (1 million pounds) to play with the CSKA Moscow professional club.
She agreed to jump ships after failing to win guarantees that she would be picked for the US team.
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Photograph: Getty Images
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