LONDON (AP) – Russia lost its appeal Thursday against the Olympic ban on its track and field athletes, a decision which could add pressure on the IOC to exclude the country entirely from next month’s games in Rio de Janeiro.
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A string of reports from the World Anti-Doping Agency and an IAAF taskforce that focused on widespread doping in Russian track and field, along with alleged cover-ups involving high-ranking government officials, have done little to convince Russian athletes that their team deserves punishment.
The pressure on Olympic officials to ban Russian Federation from the Rio Olympics became white hot last night following a landmark decision by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
CAS secretary Matthieu Reeb, following the court’s relevant ruling, said the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) had no right to enter its national field and track athletes for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Brazil.
Calls for a ban of Russia have intensified since Monday, when Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren released a report that confirmed allegations of doping and tampering with samples during the Sochi Olympics and revealed a larger system of covering up positive tests of doped Russian athletes that reached the highest levels of sport.
The IOC executive board said Tuesday it would “explore the legal options with regard to a collective ban of all Russian athletes”, and the IOC said after Thursday’s ruling it will “study and analyse” it.
“The McLaren report makes it abundantly clear that if they want to safeguard the integrity of the Olympic Games, they need to ban Russia”, Fahey said.
Olympic team leaders and sports governing bodies also received IOC advice on running their programs to protect athletes. “It goes a lot deeper than just sport or the Olympic Committee”.
The CAS panel says this rule based on “prior activity. left no possibility in practice, and as applied, for the Claimant Athletes to be able to try to comply with them”.
“iNADO is calling on the IOC and the IPC to respond in an unequivocal manner by banning the Russian delegations from the Olympic and Paralympic Games”.
So far, the IAAF has only granted exceptional eligibility to 800-meter runner Yuliya Stepanova, the whistleblower who provided much of the evidence in the investigation, and long jumper Darya Klishina, who trains in Florida.
The IOC says incidents will be handled by “a confidential procedure linked to local law enforcement agencies and relevant disciplinary channels”. The IOC said it is exploring legal options for a ban of Russian Federation entirely from the upcoming Olympics but wanted to consider the CAS decision.
“But really, it never should have gotten that far based on what Russian Federation has been accused of the past two years”, Fahey said in the interview before the CAS decision was released.
The IAAF said it was pleased that CAS had supported its ban.
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Their call has also been supported by the Institute of National Anti-Doping Organisations (iNADO), who have requested that the IOC and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) ban Russian Federation from Rio 2016. “In the opinion of CAS, because the national federation is suspended, normally these athletes should not compete in Rio, but the International Olympic Committee was not a party in these conversations and our decision is not binding on the International Olympic Committee”.
