The summer association’s position falls in line with recent comments by IOC President Thomas Bach, who has cited the need to strike a balance between “individual justice and collective punishment”.
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All worldwide Olympic winter sports federations have been asked by the IOC to “freeze” their preparations for major events in Russia, such as World Championships, World Cups or other major global competitions under their responsibility, and to “actively look for alternative organisers”.
At an emergency IOC Executive Board meeting in Switzerland, the day after an independent report detailed a systematic and state-run doping programme in Russian Federation, members fell short of an immediate ban but they did issue a series of measures relating to the report.
Following the investigation led by Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren, WADA has recommended the International Olympic Committee consider taking the unprecedented step of excluding the entire Russian team from Rio.
Following the report WADA urged a ban on Russian athletes from all worldwide sports competitions, including Rio 2016.
However, Russian track and field athletes have appealed against their ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which is due to rule by Thursday.
“The IOC will not grant any accreditation to any official of the Russian Ministry of Sport or any person implicated in the [independent] report for the Games of the XXXI Olympiad Rio 2016”, the IOC said. With less than three weeks until the start of this year’s Games on August 5, it’s unlikely the findings will be available in time to provide evidence for a finding.
McLaren said Rodchenkov and all other witnesses interviewed had been deemed credible, and the report said the investigators “confirm the general veracity of the published information concerning the sample swapping that went on at the Sochi Laboratory during the Sochi Games”.
Russia’s track and field athletes are already barred from competing at the 2016 Olympics in Rio as a result of doping violations.
“The WADA athlete committee stands with all the clean athletes of the world, and especially at this time with those clean athletes that have suffered as a result of the doping and subversion outlined in this report”. “If all the operational precautions to promote and permit doping by Russian athletes proved to have been ineffective for whatever reason, the laboratory provided a failsafe mechanism”.
Russia, which had vehemently denied any government involvement in the scandal, is already banned from worldwide athletics by the IAAF, due to doping cases exposed a year ago.
Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko told the R-Sport news agency he had suspended his anti-doping advisor Natalia Zhelanova as well as Irina Rodionova, deputy head of Russia’s state-funded Sports Preparation Centre, and two other officials.
“The right to participate at the games can not be stolen from an athlete, who has duly qualified and has not be found guilty of doping”, said Bruno Grandi, president of gymnastics’ global federation.
Pavey, who is from the South West and used to train in Yeovil, was beaten at the European Championships in 2006 by a Russian athlete who was later banned for doping.
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Russian media appeared resigned to a blanket ban in Rio. A second part of that report released in January revealed bribery and cover up of tests up to the top levels of the International Association for Athletics Federations, the governing body of the sport.
