Two-time Olympic champion pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva and European hurdles champion Sergei Shubenkov were among those in attendance not eligible for Rio.
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Those barred from competing, Putin says, are victims of “double standards” and a campaign against Russian sports.
Russian fencers are cleared to compete at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics after the sport’s governing body found no grounds to exclude any of the team for doping.
The Russian leader said the scandal, which centers on allegations that the Russian government and the FSB security service systematically covered up doping for years, had unfairly targeted many Russian sports people who had not even faced specific and proven accusations.
Apart from that, the International Olympic Committee ruled than no Russian athlete who has ever been sanctioned for doping will be allowed to take part in the Rio Olympics, even if he or she has served the sanction.
The IAAF banned the Russian athletics federation in November after an earlier World Anti-Doping Agency-funded report uncovered systemic doping in Russia’s track and field programme, and upheld that ban last month.
Fencing’s world governing body, the FIE, said it had “re-examined the results” of the drug tests taken by the 16-strong Russian team over the last two years and all were negative. The FIE did not respond to questions from The Associated Press about whether McLaren’s evidence was considered before deciding to allow Russian fencers to compete in Rio.
The International Olympic Committee has left it up to each sport’s federation to decide whether or not to allow Russian athletes to compete amid allegations of widespread doping.
Russian Federation is now 67 players down from their initial contingent of 386 athletes after the Court for Arbitration of Sports turned down their plea to revoke the ban.
The International Gymnastics Federation said it has established a “pool of eligible Russian athletes” and is awaiting IOC approval.
The IOC has received praise from Russian Federation but stinging criticism from elsewhere for failing to impose a total ban on the country over shocking evidence of a state-organised system to cheat.
Germany’s national anti-doping agency chief Andrea Gotzmann said the decision does not follow the IOC’s declared “zero tolerance” policy, saying Bach has missed “a huge chance”.
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Olympic discuss champion Robert Harting said he was “ashamed of Thomas Bach”.
