FINA is banning the reigning world breaststroke champion, Yulia Efimova, who is preparing an appeal for the Court of Arbitration of Sport.
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Mutko said that he accepted the IAAF decision was “well-grounded and a effect of a serious crisis in the management of the All-Russian Athletics Federation, as well as a deep-rooted doping problem that goes back to Soviet times”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin hit out at “discrimination” against the country’s banned track and field athletes at a Kremlin send-off ceremony Wednesday for its depleted Olympic team.
World Rowing has taken the hardest stance with Russian Federation since athletics ahead of the Rio Olympics, banning 22 of the nation’s 28 rowers from competing.
Stepanova, who is appealing against her Rio ban, said that the International Olympic Committee’s stance of leaving governing bodies to decide whether Russians could take part in the Games meant there would be Russian athletes in Rio whose cheating had been covered up.
Volleyball player Sergei Tetyukhin, a four-time Olympic medalist, will be Russia’s flagbearer for the opening ceremony in Rio, according to an Instagram post by pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva.
Russia’s weightlifting team has been dogged by doping cases and faced further embarrassment Wednesday when retests of samples from the 2012 Olympics saw four Russians, including three medalists, test positive.
Putin, a keen practitioner of judo and ice hockey, made his comments to over 100 sportspeople, some of whom have been banned from going to the Rio Games next month because of doping allegations by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and other federations.
“It’s obvious that the absence of Russian competitors — leaders in many disciplines — markedly lowers, and will lower the intensity of the fight and that means the spectacle at the upcoming events”, Putin said in a speech.
The FIE did not respond to questions from The Associated Press about whether WADA investigator Richard McLaren’s evidence was considered before deciding to allow Russian fencers to compete in Rio.
The International olympic Committee (IOC) sparked fierce criticism on Sunday when it resisted a blanket ban in favour of allowing individual sports federations to make the call on which Russians can go to Rio.
In other sports there was some good news for Moscow as the world governing body for fencing said all 16 Russians down to compete had been cleared.
The International Gymnastics Federation said it has established a “pool of eligible Russian athletes” and is awaiting IOC approval. It also said it’s now happy with its rooms at Rio’s Olympic Athletes Village.
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So far 105 of the 387 athletes Russian Federation named in their Olympic team have been barred from the Games.
