Ksenia Ryzhova says she locked lips with Yulia Guschina in celebration at their team's winning the women's 400m relay 
 
 When two Russian athletes locked lips after taking gold at the World Athletics Championships, speculation was rife that the pair were protesting against the country's recently passed anti-gay law. 
 
 After narrowly edging out the US team to win the 400m relay at Moscow's Luzhniki stadium on Saturday, Ksenia Ryzhova and Yulia Guschina celebrated their victory with a lingering kiss. They kissed again on the podium as their two teammates looked on. 
 
 But in her first comment on the incident, Ryzhova told the Guardian on Monday that the kiss was not a political statement and had nothing to do with the rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people. 
 
 "It was just happiness for our team," which has trained together for many years, Ryzhova said on Monday. She declined to comment on her attitude toward LGBT rights. 
 
 "If people want to write all sorts of dirt about us, they should at least know that Yulia and I are both married," she added. 
 
 Although the former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev was famous for kissing other leaders on the lips, including men, such platonic kissing is not a common occurrence in modern Russia. 
 
 The World Athletics Championships were widely seen as a trial run for next year's Winter Olympics in Sochi, where Russian officials have repeatedly said that authorities will enforce the law against "gay propaganda". 
 
 A growing international backlash against the legislation has led to a series of protests and calls for Russia to be stripped of the Sochi games. 
 
 The two-time Olympic gold medalist Yelena Isinbayeva defended the legislation after she won the pole vault at the championships, saying two Swedish competitors who painted their fingernails with rainbows in support of LGBT rights were being disrespectful to Russia. 
 
 "We consider ourselves like normal, standard people, we just live boys with women, girls with boys … it comes from the history," Isinbayeva said in English on Thursday. 
 
 But she backtracked from her comments in a statement on Friday, saying she opposes discrimination against gay people and "may have been misunderstood" due to her imperfect English. 
 
 On Tuesday, the US runner Nick Symmonds became the first international athlete to denounce the anti-gay law while in Russia, dedicating his silver medal in the 800m to his gay and lesbian friends back home and calling for LGBT equality. 
 
 Russia's sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, said at the weekend that the law does not violate any rights and called worries that it would infringe upon the freedoms of athletes and spectators "overblown," the state R-Sport news agency reported. ||||| Image copyright DW Espanol Image caption "This one went too far," Gonzalez Theran said about the on-air groping incident 
 
 A female reporter groped live on air at the World Cup has spoken out about harassment by sports fans. 
 
 Colombian correspondent Julieth Gonzalez Theran was working for DW Espanol in Moscow when a man grabbed her breast and kissed her cheek. 
 
 She continued her report without interruption but has since addressed the incident online. 
 
 "We do not deserve this treatment," Gonzalez Theran said. "We are equally valuable and professional." 
 
 She told her employer, Deutsche Welle, she had been on the scene for two hours preparing for the broadcast. 
 
 "When we went live, this fan took advantage of the situation," she said. "But afterwards, when I checked to see if he was still there, he was gone." 
 
 The incident happened last week in the city of Saransk ahead of the Russia-Saudi Arabia game. DW posted the footage on social media, calling it an "attack" and "blatant harassment". 
 
 Many online commentators, however, downplayed the incident. One labelled the criticism as "feminist hysteria", and others suggested the kiss should be seen as a "welcome" or a "compliment". 
 
 Gonzalez Theran continued to speak out about her treatment on Twitter, retweeting messages of support from her colleagues. 
 
 "This is not funny," DW presenter Cristina Cubas tweeted. "It's not a kiss. It's a non-consenting attack." 
 
 On Wednesday, almost a week after the incident happened, DW published an article about the controversy, in which Germany's first female national league referee branded the behaviour "unacceptable". 
 
 "For me it is an isolated incident," Gonzalez Theran said. "There are always fans that compliment you and behave respectfully. This one went too far." 
 
 Harassment of female reporters is not uncommon in sports reporting. 
 
 In March, a group of 52 Brazilian reporters launched a campaign showcasing incidents of being kissed and groped by fans and athletes, which they called #DeixaElaTrabalhar - or "Let her work". 
 
 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Sports journalist Bibiana Bolson: 'They try to kiss us and to hug and to touch us' 
 
 Last year, tennis player Maxime Hamou was banned from the French Open after forcibly kissing a female reporter during a live TV interview. 
 
 "If I hadn't been live on air, I would have punched him," the reporter, Maly Thomas, later said. 
 
 Other women working at the World Cup have also been facing criticism or abuse off-camera- and particularly online. 
 
 German football commentator Claudia Neumann has received extensive criticism on social media for her work, which her employer and colleagues have dismissed as sexist. 
 
 In the UK, the BBC's Vicki Sparks faced similar online abuse when she made history as the first female World Cup commentator on British television on Wednesday - but was widely well-received.
– It was the kiss seen 'round the world: Russian runners Ksenia Ryzhova and Yulia Guschina seemed to touch lips twice while kissing each other on the cheek on Saturday, first after managing to beat the US team to take gold in the 400m relay at the World Athletics Championships, then again on the winners podium. Speculation erupted: The blatant kisses were a protest against Russia's anti-gay law! Now the women have spoken. Ryzhova tells the Guardian it had nothing to do with gay rights (and didn't share her thoughts on the subject). What the women focused on in their comments was the "sick fantasies" borne from their moment of joy. Says Ryzhova: "Both me and Yulia are married. If anyone cares, unfortunately, we have no relationship ... We haven't won gold for eight years and you cannot imagine what it was like when we won. If we touched our lips by accident while celebrating, then, I am sorry to say, it is someone's sick fantasies. It is not at all nice to insult us, our coaches and our bosses like that." Adds Guschina: "I guess people who think that are not quite right in the head."