The IWF said no Russian weightlifter sanctioned for doping will be allowed to compete – even if they had already served their suspension – and that it was waiting for evidence from the Russian athletes entered for Rio before making its decision.
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Global federations in canoeing and modern pentathlon ruled out seven on Tuesday, including an Olympic gold medalist, following earlier rulings in swimming and rowing.
Either type of ban would likely trigger legal appeals with the clock ticking down to the August 5 start of the Games.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian media that Putin had discussed the doping issue with his national security council.
Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko – a key figure in the McLaren report who has been banned from Rio – has voiced confidence that the “majority” of the country’s 387-member team would be declared eligible for Rio.
Canada’s anti-doping chief Paul Melia called the decision disheartening and U.S. anti-doping chiefs blasted the IOC for creating “a confusing mess”, although the country’s Olympic committee issued a more measured response.
The International Olympic Committee on Sunday said Russian athletes with previous doping bans would be banned from the Rio Games.
Five Russian canoe sprint athletes – including the 2012 Olympic champion Alexander Dyachenko – have been banned from competing at next month’s Rio Olympics by the International Canoe Federation (ICF), after they were implicated by the McLaren report.
The Melbourne-based Tallent was awarded a retrospective gold medal in June for the 50 kilometer walk at the 2012 London Olympics after the victor on the day, Russia’s Sergey Kirdyapin, was stripped of the medal because of failed drug tests.
“This is a bitter blow for the Olympic movement and we are saddened that our sport in implicated”, ICF general secretary Simon Toulson said in a statement.
The couple have been invited as guests of the International Olympic Committee for the Games but Stepanov said: “I felt like ‘are you trying to buy us?’ Is that how the International Olympic Committee treats whistleblowers?”
The five Russians were banned from the games, named as Natalia Podolskaya, Alexander Dyachenko, Andrey Kraitor, Alexey Korovashkov and Elena Aniushina.
Russian Federation is not allowed to enter any athlete for the Rio Games who has ever been sanctioned for doping, even if they have served the sanction. And a third report last week alleged that workers in Russian drug-testing labs had swapped clean samples for dirty ones to help Russian athletes evade detection.
Kutsov’s place will go to Latvia’s Ruslan Nakonechnyi.
Sports such as archery, equestrianism, sailing and tennis have so far cleared competitors from the country to compete while no worldwide federations has, to date, blocked their participation.
In addition to the ban on Russia’s entire track and field team over doping, seven swimmers, two weightlifters, a wrestler and three rowers have all also been barred.
Hours after the announcement, the International Tennis Federation said it expects all eight of Russia’s nominated players to compete in Rio.
Russian Federation was cleared to compete in Rio, despite its enormous state-sponsored doping racket that has disgraced world sport for years.
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However, Andrei Mitkov, the agent of previously-banned world champion swimmer Yulia Efimova, told Russia’s Sportbox website that she would apply to CAS if she was not allowed to compete.
