WADA Compliance Committee Begins Meeting

(ATR) A World Anti-Doping Agency committee will take the next steps toward clarifying the situation with Russia’s compliance this week.

The Compliance Review Committee is meeting Monday and Tuesday to review reports about data retrieved from the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, and determine if Russia's Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) has satisfied requirements tied to the WADA decision to conditionally declare it compliant to the World Anti-Doping Code.

The two days of meetings are to produce a recommendation, which will be reviewed by the WADA Executive Committee, which has the ultimate say over any decision regarding Russia.

WADA’s Executive Committee will meet on Jan. 22, more than three weeks past a Dec. 31 deadline set by the WADA ExCo for RUSADA to turn over data from the Moscow lab. A WADA team went in last week to finish the job, after being prevented from doing so in an initial visit in mid-December.

Under terms of the conditional reinstatement, RUSADA must also grant access to stored samples for reanalysis by the end of June.

WADA revealed on social media that the executive committee would meet by conference call next week, saying it needed additional "time to review appropriately the CRC recommendation (which will be provided to them at the latest on 17 Jan) and to consult with their stakeholders". The additional delay comes afteranti-doping authorities already had to defend the meeting dates of the CRC being two weeks after Russia’s missed deadline.

Before WADA was granted access to the Moscow lab, President Craig Reedie said in a statement that both committees would "act on the basis of the 31 December deadline having been missed, with all the consequences that failure could bring" even if it was compelled to give RUSADA every opportunity to turn over the data.

The CRC could recommend that RUSADA is compliant with the September decision, or that despite receiving the data late the national anti-doping agency has not fulfilled compliance. The WADA Executive Committee could then accept whatever the CRC recommends, or forge ahead with its own decision.

Any decision will have significant impact for Russia and international sport at large. If RUSADA is not compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code then Russia would be ineligible to bid for international sport events. However, the IOC reportedly signaled that Russia was interested in bidding for the 2024 Winter Youth Olympic Games, and IOC President Thomas Bach said in his New Year’s address that the IOC considered its 2017 sanction of the Russian Olympic Committee during the PyeongChang Winter Olympics, over.

Until RUSADA is declared compliant it would be all but impossible for the International Association of Athletics Federations to lift its suspension of the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF). This would mean Russian athletes would need to be cleared to compete at the 2019 Athletics World Championships in Doha, Qatar as neutral athletes. It would be the second straight World Championships featuring neutral athletes.

Written by Aaron Bauer

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