Russia’s Olympic Committee said it would conduct activities to eradicate doping from sport and work in close collaboration with the IOC, WADA and national Olympic committees from other countries and sports federations.
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Russia’s track and field team could be suspended from the sport – nine months before next year’s Olympics in Rio de Janeiro – when IAAF President Sebastian Coe convenes a meeting of his ruling council on Friday to consider sanctions.
Russian president Vladimir Putin has ordered a thorough investigation into the alleged doping now rife among athletes of the Russian Federation, saying individual punishment should be meted out rather than the country being banned as a whole.
“It will be painful for those athletes with clean consciences who could compete, that’s the first thing”.
The report says Portugalov “administered the doping programs and even injected athletes themselves”.
The plane carrying the sports officials was forced to land in the city of Mineralnye Vody, where they have instead arranged a meeting with Russian Olympic Committee president Alexander Zhukov. However, Putin’s determination to press ahead with the session indicated the sensitivity of the issue for Russian Federation.
“The IOC has asked the IAAF to initiate disciplinary procedures against all athletes, coaches and officials who have participated in the Olympic Games and are accused of doping in the report of the independent commission”, it said in a statement. Putin himself has built much of his image on vigorous athletic exploits of his own. Mutko and Russia’s intelligence bureau, the FSB, were accused of doping cover-ups.
The report suggested the laboratory had “been involved in a widespread coverup” of positive doping tests and said 1,417 samples which WADA had wanted to be kept were targeted for “intentional and malicious destruction”.
Lord Coe, president of athletics’ governing body, the IAAF, has told the Russian athletics federation to respond to Wada’s report by Friday.
Russia says a “foreign specialist” could take over as chief of its anti-doping watchdog as the dominoes start to fall on Wednesday after a no-holds-barred report on drug-taking and corruption at the heart of Russian athletics.
“We have made it clear that we will, once we get the relevant information from IAAF, withdraw and reallocate medals with regard to Russian athletes which may have been doped”, Bach said. He said he expected the I.A.A.F.to “protect clean athletes”.
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Bach said WADA, which represents the Olympic movement and world governments, is leading the anti-doping campaign and deciding which countries are compliant or not.
