A global sporting tribunal said on Thursday that a ban on two Russian rowers and a swimmer with histories of doping was unenforceable, a ruling that opens the door wider to Russian participation at the Rio Olympic Games.
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The investigation delays allowed the International Olympic Committee president to claim that once the agency reported on its findings last month, the International Olympic Committee didn’t have enough time to determine whether it should ban all Russian teams, Robertson says in an interview with investigative journalism website Pro Publica and the BBC.
Instead, the IOC asked global federations to examine each individual Russian athlete to determine whether they should be eligible to compete.
CAS ruled that “unenforceable” on Thursday in the case of two Russian rowers but declined to obligate global federations and the IOC to allow them entry to the Games.
Russian breaststroker Yulia Efimova said on Friday she would take part in the Rio Olympics, a day after winning an appeal against a doping ban, but there was no immediate confirmation from swimming’s governing body FINA. Nearly all athletes are in a full complement virtually in all kind of sports.
Several global federations announced separately that they had received the final approval for Russian entries in their events, including boxing, judo, equestrian, volleyball and golf.
Track and field athletes were banned relatively early on in the process, but the International Olympic Committee left much of the decision making up to the individual governing bodies of each sport.
But it said the International Olympic Committee was wrong to insist Russian athletes who had previously been sanctioned could not go to the Games, calling the decision “unenforceable”.
The issue has dominated the build-up to the Rio Games in the wake of Professor Richard McLaren’s damning Wada-commissioned report into systemic state-sponsored doping across the majority of Olympic sports.
“Although we are heartbroken, we wish to clarify that we have from the beginning chosen to not follow a judicial path”, the couple said in a statement.
IOC President Thomas Bach again defended the decision not to ban the entire Russian Olympic team, insisting that athletes can not be punished for the wrongdoing of their government.
CAS held that paragraph 3 of this decision did not “respect the rules of natural justice”.
“The doping samples of Rio 2016 will be stored for ten years for reanalysis at any time appropriate”, Bach said.
“As a result, we will not file an appeal to CAS”. We can not destroy justice. The IOC boss said the sports extravaganza would send a message of hope to the watching world.
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In Rio, Portugal defeated two-time Olympic champion Argentina 2-0 and Honduras edged Algeria 3-2 in Group D action.
