The Court of Arbitration for Sport affirmed the appeal by Klishina, ruling that she remains eligible to compete in Rio and overturning a last-minute reversal by track and field’s global governing body to bar her from participating in the Olympics.
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The 25-year-old had been cleared by the IAAF to compete internationally as an independent neutral athlete after the sport’s world governing body upheld the suspension of the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) as an IAAF Member on June 17, resulting in the continued ban on Russian athletes from global competition. McLaren. Relevantly, the Athlete established that she was subject to fully compliant drug-testing in- and out-of-competition outside of Russian Federation for the “relevant period”. A source familiar with the issue said the ban related to new evidence uncovered by an anti-doping probe into allegations Russian Federation ran a systematic state-backed cheating program.
In a statement, Klishina insisted she was “clean” and said she was seeking an emergency hearing by the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s (CAS) ad hoc division in Rio.
The rest of Russia’s track-and-field athletes were banned from the Olympics by CAS last month.
‘The situation with Darya Klishina appears to be cynical mockery of the Russian sportswoman by the IAAF, ‘ Zhukov said.
“The Court of Arbitration for Sport set aside the IAAF decision and confirmed that I am a clean athlete who remains eligible to compete under IAAF rules in the Olympic Games and other global competitions”.
Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Culture, Sports, and Youth Affairs, Dmitry Svishchev, expressed his displeasure with the IAAF’s ban on Darya Klishina, calling the decision “an abuse of power” while Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko called the accusations against Darya a “campaign directed against Russian sport, to discredit it”.
According to the statement, the IAAF’s Doping Review Board determined that the athlete (Klishina) “was directly affected and tainted” by a state-organized doping scheme described in a report for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).
Klishina defended herself, saying she was clean and was appealing against the decision to sport’s highest tribunal. “It’s beyond the realm of common sense”, The Guardian reports.
Klishina, who is still here in the Athletes’ Village, was represented yesterday by American lawyer Paul Greene, founder of Global Sports Advocates.
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Now, though, she’s been forced to appeal the decision to bar her from the long jump, which starts Tuesday, emphatically denying any wrongdoing and imploring the Court of Arbitration for Sport to settle the matter quickly.
