“There were 100 criteria presented to us, and in my opinion we have fulfilled them all”, he said.
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Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko, however, said earlier in the day that his country was ready to assist WADA in any testing going forward.
According to the report, 736 requested tests of Russian athletes were declined or canceled and 73 of 455 tests could not be collected because the athlete wasn’t available, while 52 tests turned up a banned substance.
Military cities were often given as a place of residence by athletes seeking to avoid drug testers because of the difficulty in gaining access to the areas, the report said.
In addition, the report stated that officers were “intimidated when accessing military cities: armed agents threatening DCOs with expulsion from the country”.
Mutko advised doping officers to “make lists in advance” to visit such locations in order to get the required passes. “Every case should be reviewed independently”.
Asked about the report, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it “needs to be analysed by our sports experts” before he can comment on such a “sensitive topic”.
Many athlete groups outside Russian Federation have called on the IAAF to take a hard line, citing a loss of faith in the entire drug-testing system.
Sports geopolitics – and the key issue of individual justice vs. collective punishment – frame the debate heading into the meeting of IAAF leaders in Vienna.
At the Russian National Walking Championship on February 27, 15 athletes mysteriously did not start, withdrew or were disqualified, the report said.
“I feel conflicted saying that, but how do you stop this and prevent it in the future if you don’t have a big ban like that?” she said.
The WADA report has been published just two days before the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) is due to give its long-awaited decision on whether athletes from Russia will be allowed to compete at the Rio Olympics in August.
This follows the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) report last night which highlighted wide-ranging and serious problems remaining with the Russian testing system even after improvements were supposedly made.
IAAF President Sebastian Coe has said the ban will only be lifted if there is clear evidence of a “verifiable change both in anti-doping practice and culture”.
The thrust of the Times’ story is that WADA, which is funded by the International Olympic Committee and various governments, is at best a toothless organization with no investigatory powers run by people with massive conflicts of interest, and at worst a smokescreen designed to create the illusion that the International Olympic Committee cares about doping while secretly working to maintain the status quo.
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As doping allegations continue to mount against Russian Federation, three of its athletes are set to pick up Olympic gold medals after Kazakh weightlifters failed doping retests from the 2012 London Games.
