Thursday’s ruling is likely to weigh heavily on whether the International Olympic Committee could exclude the entire Russian team across all sports, not just track following new allegations of a vast state-sponsored doping program that covered many Olympic sports.
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This was due to widespread doping revelations in track and field with the outcome of a Russian appeal made to the Court of Arbitration for Sport due tomorrow.
This would ease those concerned by the potential unfairness of a collective punishment, appease a nation that hosts more major sports events than any other and probably allow those Russians that get through the vetting process to compete in Russian colours, and not as “neutral athletes” under an Olympic banner.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is now deliberating a total ban on Russian athletes at the competition, following a damning report on state-backed doping from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has called for Russian Federation to be banned from all worldwide sporting competitions until a “culture change” is achieved, with others backing this view.
“We remember many countries boycotted the 1980 Olympics”, Zhukov added.
Dick Pound, an International Olympic Committee member and former WADA president, said it was right for the International Olympic Committee to take time to make a decision.
As it stands, the IAAF has approved just two Russians to compete, as “neutral athletes”, after they showed they had been training and living overseas under a robust drug testing regime.
The Association of Summer Olympic Federations has also urged caution.
“We are waiting for the CAS decision”. Should the International Olympic Committee then impose a total ban across all sports, Russian athletes though probably not the track and field team could conceivably appeal again to CAS.
The IOC also ordered a disciplinary commission to look into the sports ministry’s role in the drug cheating that included Russia’s secret service swapping dirty urine samples for clean ones through a hole in a wall at the Sochi Olympics.
This comes despite the International Olympic Committee pledging to deny accreditation to any official of the Russian Sports Ministry or any person implicated in the McLaren Report.
By EDDIE PELLS AP National Writer Russian Olympic athletes are as much pawns as true players in the drug-infused game in which their government broke rules in a brazen attempt to win medals at any.
The scandal has led to increasing calls for Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko to be sacked, but President Vladimir Putin has not yet gone down this path.
– The IOC will not organise or give patronage to any sports event or meeting in Russian Federation.
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The McLaren case against Russian Federation followed allegations made by the former boss of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory Grigory Rodchenkov who is in hiding in the United States and is wanted by Russian Federation.
