Anti-doping Body Blasts IOC Over Russia Decision

(ATR) A group of national anti-doping organizations says the IOC’s management of the Russian doping crisis "has gone from bad to worse".

After two Russian doping positives at the PyeongChang Olympics, the IOC decided on Sunday against lifting the suspension on the Russian Olympic Committee to allow the country’s athletes to march under their own flag at the closing ceremony. But the IOC said the ban will be removed if no more Russian doping cases emerge from analysis of all doping tests for PyeongChang 2018.

The Institute of National Anti-Doping Organisations said the IOC’s decision to maintain the suspension of the Russian Olympic Committee for the closing ceremony. "was made for pragmatic rather than principled reasons".

"It has taken two positive tests on Russian athletes to force the IOC’s hand when its clear intention had been to readmit the ROC before the closing of the Pyeongchang Games," the iNADO statement said.

"The disappointing fact that this is another short-lived, negotiated deal, to be lifted promptly within the next few days, indicates the IOC’s management of this issue has gone from bad to worse."

The anti-doping body said the IOC had failed to deliver a proportionate punishment, "requirements to acknowledge Russia’s broken system and take significant steps to fix it, was required. In light of the current decision, such a course of action forms no part of their agenda."

"Clean athletes who have had their Olympic moments stolen, whether it be by missing a medal or even failing to qualify as a result of false results achieved by Russian athletes, deserve a more principled and steadfast response," iNADO said.

The statement added: "Successive decisions by the IOC in this matter have demonstrated that the interests of these clean athletes have no priority.

"Can the IOC be held to account for not demanding honesty, integrity, and fair play in this matter? Will the sponsors and broadcasters of the Olympic Games contemplate this question?."

IOC president Thomas Bach yesterday defended his committee’s handling of the Russian crisis.

Bach said the IOC plan to remove the Russian Olympic Committee’s suspension despite two positive doping tests – 50 percent of the positives at the Games in PyeongChang – was because neither one showed "systemic or systematic doping" by athletes or ROC officials.

"I don’t think quite frankly these Olympic Winter Games have been tainted by the Russian affair because we had no Russian team here," Bach said, adding that the two Russian doping violations "are cases of negligence."

The ROC’s ban is expected to be lifted imminently - "a few days or a few weeks", the IOC has said. Around the Rings is told that no IOC meeting or teleconference about the issue is planned in the next 72 hours.

WADA’s statement reacting to the IOC’s pathway for Russian reinstatement makes clear the countryhas not yet done enough to gain compliance with its World Anti-Doping Code.

"For the avoidance of doubt, it should be clarified that the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) remains non-compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code as it has not yet met the necessary criteria of RUSADA’s roadmap to compliance, following Russia’s proven systemic manipulation of the doping control process. Russia’s state-sponsored doping program was first exposed by WADA’s independent McLaren Investigation in July 2016.

WADA has been working with RUSADA for more than two-and-a-half years, since declaring Russia non-compliant, to assist the country in rebuilding a credible and sustainable anti-doping program.

Russian IOC member Shamil Tarpishchev told TASS he expected good news very soon: "I hope that on Tuesday or Wednesday we will be restored. We are waiting for the latest doping tests."

Nicole Hoevertsz, head of the IOC's Olympic Athletes of Russia Implementation Review Panel, told the Russian news agency on Sunday that the IOC may make its decision on reinstating the ROC in early March.

Reported by Mark Bisson

25 Years at #1: Your best source of news about the Olympics is AroundTheRings.com, for subscribers only.