A three-member International Olympic Committee panel will choose the final Russian team for the Rio Olympics.
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The panel will be comprised of Juan Antonio Samaranch Jnr, son of the former IOC president; Claudia Bokel, an IOC Executive Board Member; and Ugur Erdener, head of the IOC Medical Commission.
The start of the Olympics was in danger of being plunged into chaos by the Russian doping crisis last night (Sunday) after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) admitted a final ruling on the expulsion of the country’s athletes may not be made until hours before Friday’s opening ceremony.
Sure the entire Russian track and field team was banned prior to the release of the report, but we cant help but feel more should have been excluded. “We are more confident than ever that we will have great Olympic Games “à la Brazil” with a great spirit”.
The board also discussed Rio de Janeiro’s “Olympic legacy”, such as the new Metro line, the port’s revitalization and new highways built exclusively for buses, Bach said.
According to the details, the commission claimed it had found evidence that Russia’s Sports Ministry and the Center for the Training of Russian National Teams and the Federal Security Service had covered up a doping program in Russian sports.
The IOC has been roundly criticised by anti-doping bodies, athletes groups and Western media for not imposing a total ban on Russian Federation.
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach batted away criticism of his organization’s handling of the Russian doping scandal that has hijacked the lead-in to the Rio Games, characterizing systematic doping as an attack on the Olympics and the values it represents.
To handle doping cases at the Games, the CAS opened two temporary offices in Rio de Janeiro.
“Urgent lessons must be learned from these events, in Russian Federation first of all, but also in all of global sport”, he said.
The turmoil centers on the Russian contingent and hurried deliberations over which of its athletes should be allowed to compete when the Games begin on Friday.
Bach is known to enjoy a close relationship with President Putin and he was asked directly yesterday if his leniency was a result of pressure from his Russian political allies.
Bach also said the IOC decision to ban whistleblower 800-meter runner Yulia Stepanova is in line with the Olympic Charter.
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‘There will, as always, be some last-minute challenges but we’ve seen that this can be addressed by our hosts’. More re-testing is expected to continue throughout and after the Rio Games. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.theeagleonline.com.ng as the source.
