WADA express concern after Russian athletes see Olympic doping bans overturned
Thursday 8 February 2018 09:09, UK
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) have expressed their concern after 28 Russian athletes had their Olympic doping bans overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
CAS ruled on Thursday that evidence was "insufficient" that the 28 athletes - including several medalists - had broken anti-doping rules at the 2014 Olympics in Sochi.
The 28 who had their bans lifted could now seek late entry into the Pyeongchang Games, although Sky Sports News understands their participation in South Korea is unlikely.
CAS reduced sanctions against a further 11 Russians, imposed after the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, to now only ban them from the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea.
Team GB's 2014 four-man bobsleigh team look set to benefit from the ruling and are in line to be upgraded to the bronze medal position.
A WADA statement, released on Thursday evening, read: "WADA notes with serious concern the decisions by CAS, relating to the 2014 Sochi Olympic Winter Games, to uphold the appeals of 28 Russian athletes while also essentially rejecting the appeals of 11 others against suspensions issued by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for anti-doping rule violations when all 39 athletes were part of Russia's systemic doping program.
"WADA understands that this decision will cause dismay and frustration among athletes. The agency supports the IOC's intention to analyse these decisions very carefully and consider all options, including an appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal.
"The fact that the appeals by 11 athletes were rejected by CAS confirms the findings of the IOC's Schmid Commission, which was formed in July 2016 to investigate Russia's systemic manipulation of the doping control process. This manipulation had been exposed by the WADA-commissioned independent McLaren Investigation Parts I and II.
"The McLaren Investigations, the mandate of which was to confirm institutionalised manipulation of the doping control process, have been confirmed once again.
"WADA will not comment further on these decisions until it has seen the full reasoning."
Regarding Thursday's ruling, CAS said it "unanimously found that the evidence put forward by the IOC in relation to this matter did not have the same weight in each individual case. In 28 cases, the evidence collected was found to be insufficient to establish that an anti-doping rule violation was committed by the athletes concerned".
The IOC has already invited 169 Russians to the Pyeongchang Olympics under a neutral flag, but may now be forced to allow in athletes it deems dopers, eight days before the Games begin.
It was not immediately clear how many of the 28 Russians would now seek to compete. Some have already retired from competitive sports.
The IOC last year banned 43 Russians over doping offences at the Sochi Olympics, ruling they had been part of a scheme to dope.
The Russian director of the laboratory which handled samples for the Sochi Games, Grigory Rodchenkov, said he gave cocktails of banned steroids to athletes and swapped tainted samples for clean urine on orders from Russian state sports officials.
The Russian government vehemently denies ever supporting doping. Three more appeals, all involving retired biathlon competitors, will be heard later.
