rferl--2019-02-22--IOC Assails Indias Decision To Deny Entry Visas To Pakistani Sports Competitors

IOC Assails India's Decision To Deny Entry Visas To Pakistani Sports Competitors

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has suspended all Indian applications to host future events and called for the country’s international sports isolation after two Pakistanis were denied visas for a competition in New Delhi.      The IOC on February 22 said it had been informed that Indian authorities did not grant entry visas to the Pakistani delegation for the 25-meter rapid-fire pistol event at the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) World Cup.      At stake in the competition are two places at next year's Tokyo Olympics.      The visa refusal comes as tensions are rising to new highs between the rival nuclear powers.      India has blamed Pakistan for a February 14 attack in Indian-administered Kashmir that killed more than 40 soldiers, and it has warned its neighbor of a "jaw-breaking response."      Islamabad has denied any involvement and vowed to retaliate if it comes under attack.      The attack on Indian troops was claimed by the Pakistan-based Jaish-e Mohammad (JeM) militant group.      The ISSF said on February 20 that it faced "an urgent situation as Pakistani athletes cannot get entry visas to participate in the competition" because of the Kashmir attack.      The IOC said that "since becoming aware of the [visa denial] and in spite of intense last-minute...efforts...and discussions with the Indian government authorities, no solution has been found to allow the Pakistani delegation to enter India in time to compete.”      "As a result, the IOC Executive Board also decided to suspend all discussions with the Indian [National Olympic Committee] and government regarding the potential applications for hosting future sports and Olympic-related events in India," it said.      The IOC said India’s action went against the principles of the Olympic charter relating to discrimination and political interference from the host country.  The IOC said the Olympic spots would still be at stake in the competition, "in the interest of the other 500 athletes from 61 countries participating in the other events who are already in India for their competition."  The body also urged all international sports federations not to hold events in India, or grant it rights to host future competitions, until the government had provided "clear written guarantees" to ensure access for all athletes.  Rajeev Mehta, secretary-general of the Indian Olympic Association (IOA), told Reuters that the developments constituted "a big setback for sports in the country.”      "We've been in constant touch with the government, trying to explain to them and convince them to grant visas to the Pakistani shooters. This is really unfortunate," he said.


sputnik--2019-11-26--IOC Welcomes WADA's Proposal to Let 'Clean' Russian Athletes Take Part in Int'l Competitions

The International Olympic Committee said in a statement on Tuesday that it favours the decision made by the World-Anti Doping Agency to allow 'clean' Russian athletes to participate in international competitions.  Addressing the issue of the alleged manipulation of anti-doping data at a Moscow laboratory, the Committee said that the involvement of the Russian Olympic Committee and its staff in data tampering has not been proven.  The IOC said they requested the Russian authorities to hand raw laboratory samples to WADA, adding that the latter should provide information about the data manipulations to the Council of Europe and UNESCO.  The international organisation added that it will back the toughest sanctions against everyone involved in meddling with the data from the Moscow laboratory.  Meanwhile, AFP reported citing an unnamed source that the Euro 2020 football tournament is not included in WADA's ban on Russia's right to host major sporting events.  On Monday, WADA's Compliance Committee issued a recommendation barring Russia from applying to be a host of international competitions for four years. The recommendation also prohibited the use of the national flag by Russia's team at major events.  However, the recommendation allowed Russian athletes to participate in competitions, provided that they are not in violation of the anti-doping code.  In 2015, WADA launched compliance proceedings against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) accusing the latter of a large-scale state-funded doping scheme involving thousands of athletes, coaches and sports officials. Russia denied the claims but the country's athletes were forced to compete under the Olympic flag at the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea.  In September 2018, the ban was lifted but RUSADA was required to offer WADA access to the database of Russian athlete records.  In September 2019 another non-compliance procedure was launched against RUSADA over suspected data manipulation. Russia was given three weeks to explain "inconsistencies" found in probes previously received from the Russian laboratories. Moscow submitted its answers to the agency in early October. After examining the data provided by Moscow, WADA said that some of the records had likely been 'altered.'


sputnik--2019-12-28--IOC Does Not Rule Out Reviewing Cases of Russian Athletes

Gunter Younger, the director of intelligence and investigations for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), earlier expressed his hope in an interview with sportschau.de that new evidence from a study of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory’s database would resume proceedings against Russian athletes that had been acquitted or partially acquitted by CAS in February 2018.  In 2018, before the Winter Olympics, a number of leading Russian athletes, who have not received an invitation from the International Olympic Committee to participate in the Games, filed a suit against the IOC demanding to be admitted to the Olympics. Recently, CAS fully overturned the IOC ban for 28 Russian athletes, 11 others got their appeals partially upheld, while the appeals of 32 athletes were dismissed. 169 Russian athletes were registered for participation in the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics under a neutral flag.  On 5 December 2017, the IOC suspended the Russian Olympic Committee over an alleged state-sponsored doping scheme in the country. The Russian authorities have repeatedly refuted allegations of a state-sponsored doping system. They were supported by the head of the IOC-established commission Samuel Schmid who said there was no proof of state support for the doping system in Russia.  In November 2019, the WADA Executive Committee imposed a ban on Russian athletes, suspending them from taking part in international sporting events, including world championships, the Olympic and Paralympic Games, for four years. WADA also declared RUSADA non-compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code. Russian President Vladimir Putin called WADA's decision to remove Russia from international sports not consistent with common sense or law and bearing a political connotation.


tass--2019-06-24--IOC to allocate 925 mln for organizing 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy

IOC to allocate $925 mln for organizing 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy

LAUSANNE, June 24. /TASS/. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will allocate $925 mln for organizing and holding the 2026 Winter Olympic Games in the Italian cities of Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo , IOC President Thomas Bach said on Monday.  The vote to determine the host of the 2026 Winter Olympics was held at the 134th session of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Lausanne earlier on Monday. Stockholm also was a contender to be named the host of the Games. The contract between the IOC and the Olympic applicaiton committee in Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo was signed after the results of the vote had been announced by Bach.  Italy will host the Olympics for the fourth time. It is in the Alpine town of Cortina d'Ampezzo that the Soviet Union national team participated in the Winter Olympics for the first time in 1956. In 1960, Rome hosted the Summer Olympics, while Turin was the host city of the 2006 Winter Olympics.  The 2022 Winter Olympics will be held in Beijing.


tass--2019-06-25--IOC adds Break Dance to its official program of 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris

LAUSANNE, June 25. /TASS/. The sport of break dancing as well as three other new sports competition were included in the official program of the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced in its statement on Tuesday.  The sport of break dance debuted at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games (YOG), which were hosted by Buenos Aires last October. Russia’s Sergei Chernyshev was the first to become the champion of this new Olympic competition.  "Breaking, skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing have been provisionally included on the sports program of the Olympic Games Paris 2024," the statement from the IOC reads. "The decision was taken today by the 134th session of the International Olympic Committee."  The statement from the world’s Olympics governing body also quoted its president Thomas Bach as saying: "The four sports that Paris has proposed are all totally in line with Olympic Agenda 2020 because they contribute to making the program more gender balanced and more urban, and offer the opportunity to connect with the younger generation."  "The proposed sports are in line with these principles and enhance Paris 2024’s overall dynamic Games concept, which focuses on inclusivity, inspiring a new audience and hosting socially responsible Games," IOC President Bach added.  The break dance competition offers two sets of the medals and will include 16 male and 16 female competitors.  "The proposal for the four sports builds on the evolution of the program from Tokyo 2020 and includes 248 athletes, which will fit within the 10,500-athlete quota, with equal numbers of women and men," according to the statement from the IOC.  "In-keeping with its commitment to host sustainable Games, Paris 2024 will use 95% existing or temporary venues to stage the competitions" the statement from the IOC added.  In March, the IOC announced its approval for the introduction of break dance, mountain climbing, skate boarding and surfing competitions on the list of the Olympic competitions in Japan in 2020.  The 2020 Summer Olympic Games will be held in Tokyo’s Japan between July 24 and August 9 and will see a total of 339 sets of medals to be contested in 33 sports (50 disciplines). The 2024 Summer Olympic Games will be held in the French capital of France between July 24 and August 11.


tass--2019-07-05--IOC launches inquiry into reports of Rio-2016 Olympic bids alleged bribery

IOC launches inquiry into reports of Rio-2016 Olympic bid’s alleged bribery

The Brazilian daily O Globo reported late on Thursday that former governor of Rio de Janeiro Sergio Cabral, who is currently serving a long-term sentence on counts of corruption and fraud, had confessed that in 2009 he had paid a bribe to then-President of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) Lamine Diack to secure the votes in favor of Brazil’s bid to host the 2016 Olympics.  MOSCOW, July 5. /TASS, Artyom Kuznetsov/. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is inquiring into reports about an alleged bribery scheme used to select Rio de Janeiro as the host of the 2016 Summer Olympic Games, the IOC press office said in a statement addressed to TASS.  Cabral also testified, according to the daily, that nine members of the IOC (International Olympic Committee), including Olympic legends Alexander Popov of Russia and Sergey Bubka of Ukraine, had been bribed as well to vote for Rio de Janeiro.  "The IOC Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer (CECO) has immediately followed up on the allegations made by the former Rio State Governor Sergio Cabral, who is already serving a jail term for corruption," the IOC statement reads.  "The CECO has contacted the IOC Members mentioned in his testimony," according to the statement. "The IOC is fully committed to address any issues also those which happened before the far reaching reforms of Olympic Agenda 2020."  "With these reforms the IOC has turned the page with regard to good governance and in particular the procedure of the election of host cities," the statement added.  The voting for the host city of the 2016 Summer Olympic Games was held in three rounds on October 2, 2009 at the 121st IOC Session in Copenhagen, Denmark. In the final third round of voting Rio de Janeiro’s bid won with 66 votes against Spain’s Madrid with 32 votes.  Popov, a four-time Olympic champion in swimming and an honorary member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), told TASS on Friday he intended to file a defamation lawsuit in the wake of reports over his alleged involvement in the suspected bribery scheme.  Russia’s 47-year-old legendary swimmer served as a member of the International Olympic Committee between 2000 and 2016. He is currently a non-voting honorary member of the IOC.  World’s pole vault legend Sergey Bubka, who is a member of the IOC since 1999 and is also the president of the Ukrainian National Olympic Committee, has also denied the allegations on his involvement in the unproved bribery scandal.


tass--2019-08-30--IOC announces dates and venues of boxing qualifiers for 2020 Olympics in Tokyo

MOSCOW, August 30. /TASS/. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Boxing Task Force confirmed on Friday the dates and the names of the host cities, which will hold five boxing qualification events for the 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo.  "Four Continental Events and a final World Qualification Event will be held between February and May 2020 to give boxers the opportunity to seal their places at the Tokyo 2020 boxing tournament," the IOC said in a statement.  The five Qualification Events are: Asia/Oceania continental tournament (Wuhan, China, on February 3-14, 2020); Africa continental tournament (Dakar, Senegal, February 20-29, 2020); European continental tournament (London, Great Britain, March 13-23, 2020); America continental event (Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 26-April 3, 2020) and the final World Qualification Event in Paris, France, on May 13-24, 2020.  "The World Qualification Event will give athletes a second chance to qualify and will therefore be open only to those boxers who have not yet qualified for the Games," the statement reads.  Commenting on the upcoming qualification events Boxing Task Force Chair and IOC Member Morinari Watanabe said: "The Qualification Events represent a fair and transparent pathway to the Olympic Games with equal opportunities for all National Olympic Committee."  "Everything is being done to provide world-class Qualification Events and to ensure the best possible conditions for the athletes," Watanabe stated.  The Olympic Boxing Task Force Group also announced on Friday the formation of the Athlete Ambassador Group, which is set to provide "valuable athlete input and feedback to the Task Force and promote the athlete voice and representation in boxing, for Tokyo 2020 and beyond."  "The Athlete Ambassadors will comprise 10 boxers, one man and one woman from each of the five regions, providing gender equality and global representation," the IOC statement reads. "The 10 will be selected from among nominations received from National Olympic Committees and National Federations by 30 September. They will be joined by additional athletes elected by their peers at each of the four continental events."  The 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo will be held between July 24 and August 9, 2020. The sport of boxing at the Olympics in Tokyo will be represented by 186 male and 100 female boxers (compared to 250 men and 36 women at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro).  The road of boxing to 2020 Olympics  On November 30, 2018, the IOC halted all planning for the 2020 Olympic boxing competitions in Tokyo. That decision followed an investigation into activities of the International Boxing Association (AIBA).  The IOC claimed at that time that the organization’s financial operations, management and ethics raised suspicions. The IOC also voiced its concern over Gafur Rakhimov’s appointment to the post of the president of AIBA, claiming the boxing official from Uzbekistan had been targeted by the US Treasury Department and was suspected of connections with an international criminal network.  The AIBA Executive Committee announced on March 23 its decision to appoint Mohamed Moustahsane of Morocco to the post of the AIBA Interim President in place of Rakhimov.  In late June, the International Olympic Committee ruled at its 134th session in Lausanne to strip the world’s governing boxing body AIBA of its Olympic status, but also made a decision to keep the sport of boxing on the program of the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo.  The IOC Executive Board proposed to organize a boxing program for the next year’s Olympics in Japan composed of 13 weight categories, eight for men and five for women (compared to 10 for men and 3 for women at Rio 2016).  The confirmed weight categories for men’s events include: Fly (48kg to 52kg); Feather (52kg to 57kg); Light (57kg to 63kg); Welter (63kg to 69kg); Middle (69kg to 75kg); Light Heavy (75kg to 81kg); Heavy (81kg to 91kg) and Super Heavy (91kg to over-91kg).  The approved five weight categories in women’s boxing events at the 2020 Olympics are: Fly (48kg to 51kg); Feather (54kg to 57kg); Light (57kg to 60kg); Welter (64kg to 69kg) and Middle (69kg to 75kg).  The organization of the boxing tournament in Tokyo is managed by a special IOC body, led by Morinari Watanabe, an IOC member and the chair of the ad-hoc Boxing Task Force Group.


tass--2019-09-23--IOC to follow WADAs rules regarding Russias participation in 2020 Summer Olympics

IOC to follow WADA’s rules regarding Russia’s participation in 2020 Summer Olympics

MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will be following the regulations of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) regarding the issue of Russia’s participation in the 2020 Summer Olympics in Japan, the IOC press office announced to TASS on Monday.  "According to the new WADA rules, effective as of April 2018, this process is conducted by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the IOC fully respects this procedure," the IOC press office replied to a question whether the Russian national team would be allowed to take part in the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo in case the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) is stripped of its compliance status with the WADA Code.  President of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) Stanislav Pozdnyakov believes for his part that Russian athletes risk facing certain sanctions imposed by international sports federations due to reasons they had nothing to do with.  On Monday, reports emerged that the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) had initiated consideration of the issue of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) non-compliance with the international organization’s code due to inconsistencies between the database of the Moscow anti-doping lab WADA has access to and the data it received in January 2019.  "Judging by the fact that the WADA Executive Committee has already initiated fast-track consideration of RUSADA’s status issue based on the Compliance Committee’s report, the situation is very serious," the ROC press service quoted Pozdnyakov as saying. "In a short time of three weeks, our organizations overseeing submissions of the database need to either conclusively disprove the accusations of any machinations on the Russian side or undertake thorough measures to identify persons involved in this case. Otherwise, along with the problem of RUSADA’s status and ramifications for our sports arising from that, the Russian national team’s prospects of taking part in the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo will be jeopardized."  "We have made a lot of diplomatic effort to restore trust of the international sports community and the Russian athletes’ rights to compete at Olympic events without any restrictions. However, we are now again running the risk of facing certain sanctions due to reasons we had nothing to do with," the ROC press service quoted Pozdnyakov as saying.  RUSADA was reinstated last September after fulfilling a number of conditions. The Russian side was obliged to provide WADA with access to original database of the Moscow lab containing information on Russian athletes’ checks and doping samples given between 2012 and 2015.  Russia submitted all the necessary data to WADA, however, the conditions laid out that the requirements would be considered fulfilled only if the integrity of the database was confirmed. Currently, doubts have been raised about that, which prompts WADA to initiate consideration of RUSADA’s non-compliance issue with the international code.  RUSADA was seeking reinstatement for almost three years — since November 2015. Back then, the organization was stripped of its compliance status following a doping scandal around the Russian athletics. The ban was repeatedly reinstated in line with the investigation led by a WADA independent commission spearheaded by Richard McLaren.


tass--2019-11-05--New doping test procedure may be launched at 2020 Games in Tokyo, says IOC chief Bach

WADA announced last month in a statement that it had signed a series of memorandums of understanding with "seven Anti-Doping Organizations (ADOs) regarding the development and implementation of dried-blood-spot (DBS) testing."  KATOWICE /Poland/, November 5. /TASS/. A new method of doping testing, which was announced by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in October, may be used as early as starting from the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Thomas Bach, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), said on Tuesday.  "Based on the progress with regards to anti-doping research, which has been made thanks to the joint efforts with the governments and WADA, we can look confidently to the future," IOC President Bach said speaking at the 5th World Conference on Doping in Sport, hosted by Poland’s Katowice on Tuesday.  "In this respect, one of the promising collective research projects is the Dried Blood Spot method," the IOC president continued. "This DBS method could very well revolutionize the anti-doping fight, since it will allow for fast, simple and cost-effective collection of samples that can be easily and cheaply transported and stored."  According to the statement from WADA last month, the seven anti-doping organizations, which signed the memorandum of understanding are: Antidoping Switzerland, Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority, the China Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA), IOC, ITA (the International Testing Authority), Japan Anti-Doping Agency and the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA).  "Reflecting the spirit of all stakeholders joining forces, this is very much a collaborative project between WADA, the IOC, the International Testing Agency, as well as several National Anti-Doping Organizations, including the United States, China, Japan, Switzerland and Australia," Bach stated.  "In a meeting between these partners, it was agreed that the DBS method should be implemented no later than at the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 but that some aspects of DBS testing could be used as early as the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020," the IOC president added.  The 2020 Summer Olympic Games in Tokyo are scheduled to be held between July 24 and August 9 and the 2020 Summer Paralympic Games will run between August 25 and September 6.  During the 128th IOC session in Kuala Lumpur on July 31, 2015, Beijing was elected the host city for the 2022 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games making the Chinese capital the first city ever to host both Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games (in 2008) as well as Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games (in 2022).


tass--2019-11-18--Airbnb and IOC Announce Major Global Olympic Partnership

ONDON, Nov. 18, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- The International Olympic Committee (IOC) and Airbnb today announced a significant agreement to support the Olympic Movement through to 2028. The nine-year, five-Games partnership is designed to create a new standard for hosting that will be a win for host cities, a win for spectators and fans, and a win for athletes.  In line with the Olympic Agenda 2020, the IOC's strategic roadmap for the future, and Airbnb's mission to promote sustainable travel, the agreement will support the sustainability objectives of the Olympic Movement. These joint efforts will be in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals to provide travel options that are economically empowering, socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable. The agreement includes accommodation provisions that will reduce costs for Olympic Games organizers and stakeholders, minimize the need for construction of new accommodation infrastructure for the Olympic Games period, and generate direct revenue for local hosts and communities. Working together with the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), we will work to increase accommodation that supports accessibility for people with disabilities or other accessibility needs.  Airbnb Co-founder, Joe Gebbia said: "Airbnb and the IOC have a strong track record in creating and accommodating the world's greatest events. Our Olympic partnership will ensure that the Games are the most inclusive, accessible and sustainable yet, and leave a lasting positive legacy for athletes and host communities. Airbnb's mission is to create a world where anyone can belong anywhere, and we are proud that the Olympic spirit will be carried by our community."  IOC President Thomas Bach said: "This innovative partnership underpins our strategy to ensure that the efficient staging of the Olympic Games is sustainable and leaves a legacy for the host community. With Airbnb's support, we will also develop new opportunities for athletes around the world to develop their own direct revenue streams through the promotion of physical activity and the Olympic values. From this partnership there will also be direct benefit for athletes beyond the US $5 billion the IOC is distributing during this Olympiad for their benefit to Organizing Committees and sports organization around the world."  The partnership will generate hundreds of thousands of new hosts over nine years, giving community residents the opportunity to earn extra income by providing accommodation and local experiences to visiting fans, athletes and other members of the Olympic Movement. For visitors, the Airbnb community will offer a more local and authentic way to immerse themselves in the host cities and engage with local communities. For the cities themselves, the Airbnb community represents a more environmentally sustainable way of accommodating a surge in visitors.  The IOC and Airbnb will launch Airbnb Olympian Experiences to provide direct earning opportunities for athletes, underlining the IOC's efforts to support athletes and put them at the heart of the Olympic Movement. To be launched in early 2020, this new category will bring Airbnb's goal of providing economic empowerment through hosting to athletes across the globe – beyond the timeframe and geographical location of the Games. Promoting sport and physical activity, these experiences will include everything from the chance to train with an Olympian, to exploring a city with an elite athlete. In the coming months, Airbnb and the IOC, through the , will provide support and training to athletes interested in becoming a host on the .  In addition, the IOC will make at least USD 28 million worth of Airbnb accommodation available over the course of the partnership to athletes competing at the Olympic and Paralympic Games for competition and training related travel.  Kirsty Coventry, Chair of the IOC Athletes' Commission, said: "On behalf of the Athlete's Commission, I am delighted that our new global agreement with Airbnb will benefit the athletes directly. This includes direct revenue opportunities from sharing their passion for sport through new Airbnb Olympian Experiences, as well as direct support for their accommodation needs. We work to empower athletes around the world on and off the field of play, and this agreement is another example of how we are supporting and advocating for athletes throughout their career."  Airbnb will also support the IOC in continuing to address the challenges faced by refugees around the world. The IOC has a long-standing commitment to refugees, including a cooperation with UNHCR since 1994, the creation of the IOC for the Olympic Games Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020, and the creation of the in 2017. Airbnb has been supporting refugee initiatives since 2015 through its Program, which connects generous hosts with those in need of temporary accommodation, including refugees. To date, more than 35,000 people have been housed in times of need. Over the course of the partnership, the IOC and Airbnb will establish further programs to provide long-term support to refugees.  Airbnb has previously supported the Olympic Games Rio 2016 and Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 as a domestic sponsor, as well as other major sporting events. And a that during the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, the added capacity provided through Airbnb's platform provided the equivalent of 257 hotels for guests of the Games, saving the city in terms of materials use and carbon emissions, while also providing around USD 30 million in direct revenue for hosts and generating an estimated total economic activity of USD 100 million in three weeks. Similarly, during the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018, Airbnb hosts earned a collective USD 2.3 million in income providing accommodation to 15,000 guests who would have required 46 hotels. And most recently, in Japan, Airbnb hosts across the country welcomed more than 650,000 travelers during the Rugby World Cup period, earning more than USD 70 million in host income.  Airbnb becomes the Worldwide Olympic Partner in the exclusive category of "Unique Accommodation Products and Unique Experiences Services." Worldwide Olympic Partners support every National Olympic Committee and their teams, and every Organizer of the Olympic Games, as well as providing support for athletes and the development of sport at all levels around the world. In addition, Partners promote the Olympic values and help create memorable experiences for fans worldwide.  Jiri Kejval, IOC Marketing Commission Chair, said: "Since it was founded in 2008, Airbnb has grown to become a global household name. This partnership supports the future sustainable operations of the Olympic Movement and demonstrates the ongoing appeal of the Olympic commercial programmes to the world's leading brands."  As a global Partner, Airbnb will now support the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, the Olympic Winter Games in Beijing 2022, the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris 2024, the Olympic Winter Games Milano-Cortina 2026, and the Olympic Games in Los Angeles 2028.  The agreement also includes marketing rights for the IPC and the Paralympic Games through the IOC-IPC long-term collaboration agreement, as well as for the Youth Olympic Games.


tass--2019-11-26--IOC calls for sanctions on those guilty of manipulating data from Moscow Anti-Doping Lab

MOSCOW, November 26. /TASS/. Those guilty of manipulating data of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory should be punished in the toughest way possible, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said in a statement, commenting on a report by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Compliance Review Committee (CRC).  On Monday, the CRC recommended that the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) be declared non-compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code and sanctions be imposed on Russian sports. The CRC particularly called for banning the country’s athletes from competing under the Russian flag during the next four years and also banning Russia from hosting international sporting events for the same period. The report is based "on a forensic review of inconsistencies found in some of the data that were obtained by WADA from the Moscow Laboratory in January 2019."  "With regard to the sanctions following this manipulation, we will still have to evaluate these in detail," the statement reads. "The IOC emphasizes that any sanctions should follow the rules of natural justice and respect human rights. Therefore, the IOC stresses that the guilty should be punished in the toughest way possible because of the seriousness of this infringement and thus welcomes the sanctions for the Russian authorities responsible," the IOC added. "However, given the seriousness of the manipulation, we strongly urge WADA to take further action," the statement says.  The IOC also called on the Russian authorities to "deliver the raw data on which this case is based." "This is still a matter of huge importance, since the delivery of any fully authenticated raw data will ensure that full justice can finally be done, and that the guilty can be properly punished and the innocent fully protected. In this way, the shadow of suspicion over the new generation of clean Russian athletes can be removed," the IOC emphasized.  "At the end of this process, we hope that justice will finally prevail and that there will be full and proper sanctions," the International Olympic Committee concluded.  The IOC welcomes the World Anti-Doping Committee (WADA) in its desire to offer an opportunity to clean Russian athletes, the IOC stated.  "We note that the report proves that any manipulation of the data [from the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory — TASS] is the sole responsibility of the Russian authorities," the statement reads.  "At the same time, we also note that the report finds that the sports movement has not been involved in any of this manipulation, and that the report does not indicate any wrongdoing by the sports movement in this regard, in particular the Russian Olympic Committee or its members. In this context, the IOC welcomes the opportunity offered by WADA to Russian athletes to compete, ‘where they are able to demonstrate that they are not implicated in any way by the non-compliance’," the IOC pointed out.  In September 2019, WADA opened a formal compliance procedure against RUSADA based on "inconsistencies" in data of the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab. The WADA Executive Committee is expected to hold a meeting on the issue on December 9.


tass--2019-12-05--WADA’s decision in regard to Russian sports ‘will be mandatory’ for IOC, says Thomas Bach

Asked at a press conference after a session of the IOC Executive Committee’s on Thursday whether the organization would accept a decision of WADA in regard to Russia, Bach said: "They are mandatory."  President of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) Stanislav Pozdnyakov announced on November 28 that the IOC would have no grounds stripping Russian athletes of their right to participate under a national flag at Olympic Games.  MOSCOW, December 5. /TASS/. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will accept as mandatory any decision passed by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) on possible sanctions in regard to Russian sports, IOC President Thomas Bach said on Thursday.  "The IOC in the Olympic Charter has accepted the World Anti-Doping Code, and if there is a decision being issued according to the World Anti-Doping Code, it is mandatory for the IOC," the IOC president told journalists.  On November 25, the WADA Compliance Review Committee (CRC) reiterated its previous recommendation for the world anti-doping body’s Executive Committee (ExCo) to strip RUSADA (the Russian Anti-Doping Agency) of its compliance status and came up with a recommendation of additional sanctions against Russian sports.  Among the recommended sanctions, the CRC suggested to bar Russia from all international sports competitions, including the Olympic and Paralympic Games, for a four-year period. The Committee also issued a recommendation to deprive Russia of the right to host international sports events during this period. The WADA Executive Committee will pass a final decision on Russia at its meeting on December 9 in Paris.  The WADA Executive Committee reinstated the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency on September 20, 2018 on condition that WADA experts would be granted access before December 31, 2018 to doping samples at the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, which was sealed off in connection with a federal investigation.  Specialists from WADA were granted access to the database of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory in January this year and copied 24 terabytes of information on Russian athletes’ doping samples collected between 2012 and 2015. WADA experts finished their work to retrieve doping samples from the Moscow Lab on April 30 having collected 2,262 doping samples in 4,524 containers (Samples A and B).  One of WADA’s new international standards on the compliance status states that athletes coming from countries where national anti-doping agencies are non-compliant with the WADA Code may be barred from all international tournaments, including the Olympic and Paralympic Games.


tass--2019-12-09--IOC supports WADA’s decision on sanctions against Russian sports

MOSCOW, December 9. /TASS/. The International Olympic Committee has supported the decision made by the Executive Committee of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in favor of sanctions against Russian sports, as follows from the IOC’s statement on the issue.  On Monday, WADA’s Executive Committee unanimously voted to strip the Russian Anti-Doping Agency of compliance, thus opening the floodgates of sanctions against Russian sports. Russia will be unable to host or bid for hosting major sports events. Its athletes will not be allowed to compete at world championships and Olympic Games under the national flag. WADA’s Compliance Review Committee says that the RUSADA took effective measures to fight against doping in Russian sports. At the same time according to the report "the evidence (including from WADA's recent audits of RUSADA's operations) indicates that RUSADA’s work is effective in contributing to the fight against doping in Russian sport, and that it is working productively in cooperation with other anti-doping organizations, including in investigations within Russia". Therefore, the Executive Committee accepted the recommendation not to impose any special monitoring or supervision or takeover of RUSADA's anti-doping activities in the four-year period.


theguardianuk--2019-07-05--IOC investigates allegations of bribery over Rios 2016 Olympic bid

IOC investigates allegations of bribery over Rio’s 2016 Olympic bid

The International Olympic Committee is to investigate allegations that nine of its members – including the pole vaulter Sergey Bubka and the Olympic swimming champion Alexander Popov – were bribed to vote for Rio’s 2016 Olympic Games bid.  The claims were made by the former governor of Rio de Janeiro Sérgio Cabral, who told a court he had paid $2m (£1.59m) to the former president of athletics’ governing body, the IAAF, Lamine Diack, to buy votes.  Cabral said the president of the Brazilian Olympic Committee, Arthur Nuzman, had assured him the scheme would work because Diack had a history of such behaviour.  “I said, Nuzman, what are our guarantees here? And he said, ‘traditionally he sells four, five, six votes. There is a risk that we don’t get through to the second round.”  Cabral, who has been sentenced to almost 200 years in jail for his part in a series of corruption scandals, said Diack guaranteed up to six votes for $1.5m and then came back and offered more if he was paid an extra $500,000. Cabral said he authorised the payment. “We did it,” Cabral said.  The French authorities have already charged the former athlete Frankie Fredericks in connection with the vote-buying scheme, as part of a wide investigation into Diack and his son, Papa Massata Diack, the disgraced former marketing agent for the IAAF. Last month the Diacks were also charged with money laundering and corruption.  An IOC spokesperson said its chief ethics and compliance officer had already began an investigation. “The IOC has turned the page with regard to good governance and in particular the procedure of the election of host cities,” he added.  Diack resigned as an honorary IOC member in November 2015, a day after he was suspended following the launch of a French investigation into corruption and money-laundering. Nuzman’s IOC membership was suspended in October 2017 following his arrest in Brazil on corruption charges. He is fighting the charges.  Bubka has rejected what he calls “all the false claims” made by Cabral and claimed Diack never contacted him about his vote for the 2016 hosts. Popov said he was “extremely surprised at the appearance of such information with the illegal use of my name” and promised to cooperate with the IOC inquiry. The Diacks and Fredericks have also previously denied any wrongdoing.


theguardianuk--2019-11-26--IOC calls for ‘toughest sanctions’ over deleted Russian doping tests

The International Olympic Committee has demanded the “toughest sanctions” against those responsible for deleting Russian doping tests in data handed over to the World Anti-Doping Agency – calling it “an attack on the credibility of sport and an insult to the sporting movement worldwide”. However, the IOC left the door open for Russian athletes to compete at next year’s Tokyo Olympics – provided they can show that they are clean.  That provoked a hostile reaction from the US Anti-Doping Agency chief executive Travis Tygart, who urged Wada to ban all Russian athletes from the 2020 Games after its compliance review committee found that the Moscow lab files, which were handed over to it by the Russians in January, had been manipulated.  “Russia continues to flaunt the world’s anti-doping rules, kick clean athletes in the gut and poke Wada in the eye and get away with it time and time again,” said Tygart. “Wada must stand up to this fraudulent and bullying behaviour as the rules and Olympic values demand.”  Russia was banned from last year’s Pyeongchang Winter Games as punishment for state-sponsored doping at the 2014 Sochi Olympics but 168 Russian athletes with no history of doping were cleared to compete as neutrals – a situation Wada’s compliance committee said may be repeated at Tokyo.  Tygart warned: “The response is inadequate, especially given the deceit perpetuated by the Russian sport system which is controlled by the government. Wada must get tougher and impose the full restriction on Russian athlete participation in the Olympics that the rules allow.”  The IOC maintains that “natural justice” requires them to punish any perpetrators but allow clean Russian athletes to compete. It also says there was no evidence that Russian Olympic Committee members were implicated in the “flagrant” manipulation of the Moscow lab data.  But the IOC was accused of being soft on Russia by lawyers for the whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov, who used to run the Moscow anti-doping laboratory before fleeing the country. “The Russian gangster state continues to deploy a predictable and deplorable policy of deception, evidence tampering and lying to cover up its crimes,” they said.  “The Kremlin must think the people of the world are idiots to believe this shameless and transparent stunt. Wada should be applauded for revealing Russia’s latest crime, but if the IOC and the international sports regulatory framework gives Russia yet another free pass, other countries will simply follow in their footsteps.”


theindependent--2019-06-26--Tokyo 2020 Olympics IOC officially bans AIBA from amateur boxing due to finance and government issu

Tokyo 2020 Olympics: IOC officially bans AIBA from amateur boxing due to finance and government issues

The International Olympic Committee on Wednesday officially took over the boxing qualification and competition for next year's Tokyo 2020 Olympics and suspended international boxing federation AIBA following a vote at its session.  The IOC voted unanimously to implement a recommendation of its executive board to oust AIBA from the Tokyo 2020 Games over issues surrounding its finances and governance and suspend the body until the issues are resolved.  AIBA has been in turmoil over its finances and governance for years with the federation $16 million in debt and an ongoing bitter battle over the presidency that has split the body internally.  Serbian IOC member Nenad Lalovic, who heads an IOC task force to look into the ties with AIBA, earlier on Wednesday delivered a damning report to the IOC session, saying the association could reach a debt of as much as $29m (£22.8m)  He also said AIBA had failed to reform at the top of the organisation.  AIBA president Gafur Rahimov suspended himself from the post in March because of his presence on an US Treasury Department sanctions list "for providing material support" to a criminal organisation. The Uzbek strongly denies the allegations.  Rahimov's presence on that sanctions list was extremely damaging to the IOC though he has been replaced on an interim basis by Mohamed Moustahsane.  "It exposes the IOC and its commercial partners to unacceptable reputational, legal and financial risks," he said.  Lalovic said AIBA's debt meant money would not go to sports and the athletes in the future and the organisation still faced problems with refereeing.  AIBA largely depends on Olympic Games revenues to survive between Games and has started letting people go as a result of its Olympic exclusion. The sport's governing body will discuss the IOC decision at its Executive Committee meeting on Thursday.  Japanese IOC member Morinari Watanabe, president of the international gymnastics federation, heads the task force to organise qualifiers and the Tokyo Games competition.


tass--2019-12-24--Swiss lawyer Ramoni to represent ROC interests before CAS

MOSCOW, December 24. /TASS/. Swiss lawyer Claude Ramoni will defend the interests of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), ROC President Stanislav Pozdnyakov told reporters on Tuesday.  "ROC and RUSADA [the Russian Anti-Doping Agency — TASS] will be represented by different legal firms," Pozdnyakov said. "The Executive Committee of ROC has made a decision today to select attorney Ramoni from Switzerland as such a representative," he added.  The Executive Committee of the Russian Olympic Committee has upheld the decision on the organization’s participation as a third party in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in the case of proposed sanctions of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) against Russian sports, ROC President Stanislav Pozdnyakov informed earlier on Tuesday.  On December 9, the WADA Executive Committee (ExCo) approved the recommendations of its Compliance Review Committee (CRC) to revoke the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) and to strip Russia of the right to participate in major international sports tournaments, including the Olympics, Paralympics and world championships, for a period of four years.


sputnik--2019-10-09--WADA Confirms Receiving Moscow Lab Data Regarding RUSADA Code Compliance

Later in the day, WADA said it had received the required response from the Russian authorities.  "WADA can confirm it has received a response from the Russian authorities to a list of detailed and technical questions WADA’s Intelligence and Investigations (I&I) raised around the nature of the data that were retrieved from the Moscow Laboratory in January 2019. The questions were sent to give the authorities an opportunity to explain a number of inconsistencies, in line with WADA’s decision on 17 September 2019 to open a formal compliance procedure against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency", the agency said in a Tuesday statement.  A non-compliance procedure was launched against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) in September, in light of allegations of data manipulation. WADA gave RUSADA three weeks to provide an explanation.  A doping scandal erupted in late 2014 after freelance German journalist Hajo Seppelt concocted a spurious plot in a controversial documentary about alleged doping in Russian sports that was then broadcast by Germany's ARD, sparking a backlash from the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) and WADA officials. Following the release of the notorious documentary, WADA's independent commission issued a report accusing Russia of numerous breaches of global anti-doping regulations.  In September 2018, WADA reinstated RUSADA as being compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code, following an almost three-year suspension.  The IAAF has, however, denied many Russian athletes from participating in international competitions due to alleged anti-doping violations. Those who were tested as clean were allowed to compete but under neutral status only: no Russian uniform, anthem or national flag is allowed during competition.  In late September, the WADA executive committee met in Tokyo to discuss alleged RUSADA data manipulation.  The UK-based media broke the news earlier, citing sources, that Russia's participation in the upcoming Tokyo Olympics in 2020 is currently on the agenda among senior officials of the International Olympics Committee (IOC).  Russian officials have repeatedly denied that there is a state-run doping program.


tass--2019-01-12--WADA to decide on RUSADA compliance status on January 22

MOSCOW, January 12. /TASS/. The Executive Committee of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) will discuss compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) on January 22, WADA press service said on Saturday.  "… WADA ExCo to discuss Compliance Review Committee recommendation regarding RUSADA compliance status on 22 Jan via conference call," WADA wrote on Twitter. "ExCo members requested that time to review appropriately the CRC recommendation (which will be provided to them at the latest on 17 Jan) and to consult with their stakeholders."  "WADA will publicly communicate the ExCo decision on 22 Jan following the conference call," the tweet says.  On Thursday, Russian Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov said that WADA experts had begun accessing and extracting data at the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory. The work is being continued. On Friday, the WADA press service told TASS that there was no information yet when the work would be finished.  A delegation of WADA experts arrived again in the Russian capital on Wednesday to have another try to access the data of Russian athletes’ doping samples for the period of 2011-2015 stored at the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory.  The delegation is led by independent expert Dr. Jose Antonio Pascual, who is a research scientist and academic in Barcelona. He already paid a visit to Moscow with his colleagues on December 17, but was unable to accomplish the set task as his group was denied the right to use their equipment since it was not certified in Russia.  The WADA Executive Board reinstated the compliance status of the Russian Anti- Doping Agency (RUSADA) on September 20 on condition that WADA experts would be granted access before December 31 to doping samples at the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, which was sealed off in connection with a federal investigation.  Since the Russian side failed to provide access to the data from the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab before December 31, heads of 16 National Anti-Doping Agencies proposed stripping RUSADA again of its compliance status, which means that all Russian athletes would be barred from international sports competitions.  The WADA Compliance Review Committee is set to analyze at its session on January 14-15 information regarding Russia’s implementation of WADA’s requirements on the reinstatement. The Compliance Review Committee will then present a recommendation to the WADA Executive Committee, which will make a final decision in regard to the Russian Anti-Doping Agency.


tass--2019-09-23--Situation around RUSADA should not be politicized says Russian MP

Situation around RUSADA should not be politicized, says Russian MP

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) announced earlier that it had initiated a fast-track probe into the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) with the Code of the world’s governing anti-doping body based on the reported inconsistencies discovered in the data from the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory. WADA also informed the Russian side that it had a three-week time to provide explanations on the issue.  MOSCOW, September 23. /TASS/. The situation around the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) should not be politicized, Valery Gazzaev, a Russian lawmaker, football manager and former football player, said on Monday.  "I don’t think this working process should be politicized, as, say, the Western media, which are in the habit of publishing anti-Russian articles, are now doing. They have always vigorously attacked Russia — suffice it to recall the situation around the FIFA World Cup which was ultimately held in Russia at the highest possible level, despite their criticism. So, I would repeat, it is a working process and only those who are obsessed with this idea see politics behind it," Gazzaev, who is deputy chairman of the committee for physical culture, sports, tourism and youth affairs of the Russian State Duma lower parliament house, told TASS.  "RUSADA’s status has been reinstated. It provided the original database of doping samples of Russian athletes from the Moscow laboratory to WADA. The condition of the database integrity verification was known from the beginning. If WADA has any questions, the Russian side has time to answer them," he noted.  "I hope all the disputable matters will be settled in due time, and a fair decision on RUSADA will follow," he added.  Specialists from WADA were granted access to the database of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory in January this year and copied 24 terabytes of information on Russian athletes’ doping samples collected between 2012 and 2015. WADA experts finished their work to retrieve doping samples from the Moscow Lab on April 30 having collected 2,262 doping samples in 4,524 containers (Samples A and B).  The WADA Executive Committee reinstated the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) on September 20, 2018 on condition that WADA experts would be granted access before December 31, 2018 to doping samples at the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, which was sealed off in connection with a federal investigation.


tass--2019-09-23--WADA initiates fast-track RUSADA non-compliance issue consideration

MOSCOW, 23 September. /TASS/. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has launched a fast-track procedure of considering the issue of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) non-compliance, Head of the Council of Europe’s Sport Conventions Division and member of RUSADA Supervisory Board Sergey Khrychikov told TASS.  "WADA has initiated the fast-track consideration of RUSADA’s non-compliance issue in accordance with the International Standard for Code Compliance. This decision was made based on inconsistencies between WADA’s LIMS database and data from the Moscow lab retrieved in January 2019," Khrychikov said.  The decision was made at the WADA Executive Committee meeting held in Tokyo on Monday.  WADA has given Russia three weeks to explain the changes identified in the Moscow lab database, Sergey Khrychikov told TASS.  "The Russian side is asked to prepare and submit explanations of these inconsistencies to WADA in three weeks’ time," he stated.  Earlier, German ARD journalist Hajo Seppelt revealed that Russia was suspected of having manipulated the data from the Moscow laboratory, which the WADA Compliance Review Committee informed the Executive Committee about at its meeting on September 23.  RUSADA was reinstated last September after fulfilling a number of conditions. The Russian side was obliged to provide WADA with access to original database of the Moscow lab containing information on Russian athletes’ checks and doping samples given between 2012 and 2015.  Russia submitted all the necessary data to WADA, however, the conditions laid out that the requirements would be considered fulfilled only if the integrity of the database was confirmed. Currently, doubts have been raised about that, which prompts WADA to initiate consideration of RUSADA’s non-compliance issue with the international code.  RUSADA was seeking reinstatement for almost three years — since November 2015. Back then, the organization was stripped of its compliance status following a doping scandal around the Russian athletics. The ban was repeatedly reinstated in line with the investigation led by a WADA independent commission spearheaded by Richard McLaren.


tass--2019-11-23--WADA likely to declare RUSADA non-compliant - Russia’s anti-doping chief

MOSCOW, November 23. /TASS/. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is likely to agree with recommendations of its Compliance Review Committee to strip the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) of its compliance status, RUSADA President Yuri Ganus told TASS on Saturday.  The WADA Compliance Review Committee recommended the world anti-doping body’s Executive Committee overnight to Saturday to strip RUSADA of its compliance status. The Committee's recommendations are based on the reports by the WADA Intelligence and Investigations team and by independent forensic experts. The reports relate to several inconsistencies found in the Moscow Laboratory data transferred to WADA, which the Committee examined at its meeting on November 17.  "The recommendation [to strip the compliance status] is predictable, this is juridical logic. We have the conditional compliance status. One of the conditions of maintaining the compliance status was not fulfilled and previously the Executive Committee agreed with recommendations in 100% cases, this is logical. Irrespective of the RUSADA level, irrespective of what we have done, there were criteria for maintaining the status and now we need to wait for a decision," Ganus said.  WADA announced on September 23 that it had initiated a probe into the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency with the Code of the world’s governing anti-doping body based on the inconsistencies reportedly discovered in the data from the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory.  Specialists from WADA were granted access to the database of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory in January this year and copied 24 terabytes of information on Russian athletes’ doping samples collected between 2012 and 2015. WADA experts finished their work to retrieve doping samples from the Moscow Lab on April 30 having collected 2,262 doping samples in 4,524 containers (Samples A and B).  The WADA Executive Committee reinstated the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) on September 20, 2018 on condition that WADA experts would be granted access before December 31, 2018 to doping samples at the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, which was sealed off in connection with a federal investigation.  Russian athletes may be barred from international competitions, including the Olympic Games, if WADA slaps sanctions on the Russian Anti-Doping Agency. Russia may also not be allowed to host international competitions and nominate its representatives to posts in sports federations.  The WADA Executive Committee will pass its decision on RUSADA at its meeting on December 9.


tass--2019-11-23--WADA's Committee recommends to strip RUSADA of compliance status

MOSCOW, November 23. /TASS/. /TASS/. World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) Compliance Review Committee has recommended to the Executive Committee to strip the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) of the status of compliance with the World Anti-Doping Code, the WADA press service said.  The Committee's recommendations are based on reports by WADA Intelligence and Investigations and by independent experts. The reports were devoted to several inconsistencies found in the Moscow Laboratory data transferred to WADA and were considered at the Committee meeting on November 17. Further assessment included consideration of responses provided by the Russian side to a list of technical questions asked by WADA Intelligence and Investigations and experts.  WADA's Executive Committee will make a final decision on RUSADA at an emergency session on December 9.


tass--2019-12-03--WADA Executive Committee meeting to consider RUSADA status moved to Lausanne

MOSCOW, December 3. /TASS/. The key World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Executive Committee meeting next week to decide on the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) has been moved from Paris to Lausanne, the insidethegames sports news portal said.  The decision to relocate the meeting, scheduled for December 9, was due to a series of planned strikes, which could have made it difficult for WADA Executive Committee members to get to the French capital.  On December 5, a major protest against the pension reform will begin in France. Serious traffic and travel problems are expected as rail workers, airport and airline personnel and other transport sector employees are among those expected to stay out of work for an indefinite period.  On November 23, the WADA Compliance Review Committee (CRC) recommended for the world anti-doping body’s Executive Committee to strip RUSADA (the Russian Anti-Doping Agency) of its compliance status and came up with a recommendation of additional sanctions against Russian sports.  Among the recommended sanctions, the CRC suggested to bar Russia from all international sports competitions, including the Olympic and Paralympic Games, for a four-year period. The Committee also issued a recommendation to deprive Russia of the right to host international sports events during this period. The WADA Executive Committee is to pass a final decision on Russia at its meeting on December 9.


tass--2019-12-24--Schellenberg Wittmer to represent RUSADA interests in CAS process on WADA sanctions

"Schellenberg Wittmer will represent the interests of RUSADA before CAS," Pozdnyakov said.  MOSCOW, December 24. /TASS/. The Swiss-based legal firm Schellenberg Wittmer will represent the interests of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) during trial of the case on sanctions of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) against Russian sports, President of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) Stanislav Pozdnyakov told reporters on Tuesday.  On December 19, the Supervisory Board of RUSADA recommended the general meeting of its members to disagree with WADA sanctions. A formal notice of disagreement with decisions made will be sent to WADA on December 27.  Schellenberg Wittmer was founded in 2000. The firm earlier provided legal support to many Russian athletes.  On December 9, the WADA Executive Committee (ExCo) approved the recommendations of its Compliance Review Committee (CRC) to revoke the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) and to strip Russia of the right to participate in major international sports tournaments, including the Olympics, Paralympics and world championships, for a period of four years.


fortruss--2019-11-27--It Would Be A Shame If WADA Sanctions Russia From The Olympics

The author wrote last month about how “WADA’s Being Weaponized To Destroy Russians’ Dignity” in an analysis that focused on one of the intangible elements of the ongoing Hybrid War on Russia. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) alleges that the country’s national counterpart was engaged in a years-long conspiracy to cover up its athletes’ illegal doping, and the former’s Compliance Review Committee’s (CRC) investigation just concluded that the latter hadn’t adequately explained so-called “inconsistencies”. WADA’s Executive Committee will now meet on 9 December to decide whether to declare the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) “non-compliant”, which could see Russian athletes banned from next year’s Tokyo Olympics, though they might still be able to compete under the title of the “Olympic Athlete From Russia” designation like they did during the 2018 Winter Olympic Games.  Although it may not seem like it to those who haven’t been closely following this saga, the issue isn’t apolitical at all but is actually politically driven given the double standards at play that were explained in the author’s prior analysis on this topic. Even the prospective consequences themselves are political since they involve the collective punishment of all of Russia’s athletes and the nation that they represent. It’s no secret that the US and its allies are engaged in a heated rivalry with Russia at the moment, one that extends beyond the geopolitical realm and into every other one such as sports. Russia has a celebrated history of doing extremely well at international sporting events, so there’s certainly a self-interested motive from its competitors to see its representatives banned from competitions in order to improve their own prospects for success. Furthermore, because of how important these events are, Russia’s politicized removal might harm the national psyche.  Hybrid Wars aren’t just about geopolitical and economic gains, but also socio-cultural ones too, hence why sports are also an arena of rivalry in this sense. Rules are bent, broken, and selectively applied in pursuit of desired outcomes, which in this case relates to the enormous amount of time, money, and effort invested in removing Russia from international sporting events. It would be unfortunate if there was some degree of credibility to the claims that select samples might have been tampered with over the years, but even in that case, it’s morally wrong to punish every athlete and the people that they represent because of it. Blanket bans, no matter the reason or the sphere that they relate to, are by default designed to send a political message. This can either be to deter other rule-breakers and/or humiliate those who are accused of violating those selfsame rules. In this instance, the motivation to potentially impose that extreme punishment is certainly the latter.  Other countries have been suspected of breaking WADA’s rules, but the international body has either looked the other way or declined to invest anything close to the amount of time, money, and effort in investigating those claims. Russia is being singled out not just because of the severity of what’s being alleged, but due to the fact that so many other countries (chiefly Russia’s Western geopolitical and sports rivals) have a stake in the outcome of removing their top competitor from the Olympic Games and other international sporting events. From their perspective, the “return on investment” for investigating similar allegations of suspected rule-breaking by less-impressive teams doesn’t “pay off as handsomely” because their removal wouldn’t alter the dynamics of these competitions all that much. Russia’s removal, however, would literally be a game-changer in every single way, hence why that outcome is being so vigorously pursued.  If WADA was sincere in deterring other potential rule-breakers, it would only seek to punish the people directly involved in the alleged conspiracy, and only then if it was proven beyond any doubt that they were guilty, which has yet to be the case. Removing an entire team amounts to humiliating an entire nation and its many athletes who were never suspected of participating in the suspected cover-up. Doping is definitely a problem in the sports world, but WADA shouldn’t practice double standards. It needs to scrutinize all teams equally, not mostly focus on the Russian one for the self-interested reasons that were explained. There are still two weeks to go before the Executive Committee makes its final decision on the matter, but it looks like their mind has already been made up. It’ll be nothing short of a miracle if Russia isn’t banned from next year’s Tokyo Olympics, but given that the West isn’t known for playing fairly, it’ll probably go forward with WADA’s “recommendation”.


rferl--2019-01-02--National Antidoping Agencies Urge WADA To Act Now On Russias Missed Deadline

National Antidoping Agencies Urge WADA To Act Now On Russia's Missed Deadline

Sixteen national antidoping organizations (NADOs) have called on the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to take immediate action following Russia's failure to meet a December 31 deadline to hand over data from its antidoping laboratory.  "NADO leaders now call on WADA to acknowledge the gravity of this missed deadline and call for an immediate review and recommendation” from the international antidoping watchdog’s Compliance and Review Committee (CRC), said a January 2 statement supported by the NADOs of the United States and 15 other countries.  "After more than three years of review, indecision and compromise in response to the worst doping scandal in the history of sport, the time has come to demonstrate that no individual [or] nation is exempt from compliance with the World Anti-Doping Code," the statement said.  The call comes the day after WADA President Craig Reedie said he was "bitterly disappointed" that the year-end deadline was missed by Russian officials.  He said the CRC will meet on January 14 to review the situation and make a recommendation on how RUSADA's failure should be handled.  But the NADO statement said: "The importance of this situation does not warrant providing a further two weeks for Russia to comply."  "With the interest of clean sport hanging in the balance, WADA must call for CRC to convene and consider this matter without further delay," it added.  RUSADA was stripped of its accreditation in 2015 after a WADA-commissioned report found evidence of widespread state-sponsored doping in Russian track and field and other sports.  The Russian agency was conditionally reinstated in September, a move that was widely criticized by members of the antidoping movement.  If RUSADA loses its accreditation again it could lead to Russian athletes being kept from participating in the next Olympic Games and the continuation of the ban on the country's track-and-field athletes from participating in international competitions.  There are signs of disagreements within Russia over the issue. Moscow missed the December 31 deadline despite repeated pleas from the head of RUSADA, Yury Ganus, who asked President Vladimir Putin for help in getting the data -- which is reportedly in the hands of the federal Investigative Committee -- released to WADA.


rferl--2019-01-12--Report Former WADA Chief Downplays Russia Missing Lab Deadline

Report: Former WADA Chief Downplays Russia Missing Lab Deadline

The former head of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is downplaying the fact that Russia missed the latest deadline to allow international inspectors access to a Moscow laboratory.      Dick Pound told the AFP news agency on January 11 that he opposed any move to impose new sanctions against Russia.      Inspectors from WADA traveled to Russia this week, and on January 10, began to access data at a tainted testing center.      It was the second attempt after an earlier visit in December. Moscow missed the December 31 deadline to give WADA full access to lab data.      Russian sport has been under a cloud for years, after revelations of a state-sponsored doping effort involving hundreds of athletes during the 2014 Sochi Olympics.      Critics of WADA have called for Russia to be punished again for missing the deadline. Pound said he didn't think it was a major issue.      "It's not the end of the world," he was quoted as saying.      "I think it's more important to concentrate on the information and test it to make sure that it's complete and it's not been altered and then to see if there are cases of anti-doping that need to be followed up by disciplinary process," he said.      In September, WADA called for lifting sanctions against Russia and its own national anti-doping agency, RUSADA, citing improvements. Pound defended that decision.      Travis Tygart, the head of the U.S. anti-doping agency, has described Russia missing the December 31 deadline as a "total joke and an embarrassment for WADA and the global anti-doping system."


rferl--2019-05-14--Polish Sports Minister In Line To Become Next WADA President

Poland's sports and tourism minister is in line to become the next World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) president after a vote left him the only candidate remaining on the ballot.  On May 14, 34-year-old Witold Banka, a former elite athlete, beat out the Dominican Republic’s vice minister of sport and tourism, Marcos Diaz, in a vote to succeed 78-year-old Craig Reedie.      The vote in Montreal was taken by the representatives of the 21 government members on the WADA Executive Committee and Foundation board, the so- called Public Authorities.      Banka was on the ballot as the European candidate after he gained more votes than reform candidate Linda Helleland, a WADA vice president from Norway.      Banka is expected to be approved at WADA's meetings in Katowice, Poland, in November and will take over in 2020.      Banka has largely avoided discussion of the Russian doping scandal that has consumed WADA over the past four years. He has instead called for more funding for anti-doping labs around the world to put countries on equal footing.      A WADA-commissioned report that outlined evidence of systematic, state-backed doping in Russian athletics led to the suspension of Russian anti-doping agency RUSADA in 2015.      Another report a year later documented more than 1,000 doping cases across dozens of sports, most notably at the Winter Olympics that Russia hosted in Sochi in 2014.      To be reinstated, the IAAF has said Russia also must acknowledge the findings of that report -- including an admission that doping in Russia was state-sponsored.


rferl--2019-11-05--Russian Doping To Loom Large At WADA Summit

The World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) three-day conference on drugs in sport has opened in Poland, with the long-running Russian doping scandal overshadowing the proceedings.  On the opening day of the event in Katowice on November 5, outgoing WADA President Craig Reedie said the Russian scandal that erupted in 2015 was the biggest challenge the organization had faced in its 20-year existence.  Reedie said the level of cheating was "unprecedented," putting WADA under mounting pressure to work for all clean athletes as Russia's anti-doping agency, RUSADA, was declared noncompliant.  "What it taught us when it erupted was that we were not equipped to deal with such a large-scale [doping] program," he said.  Ahead of the conference, WADA's first president, Dick Pound, called for harsher treatment of athletes and countries who are found guilty of doping.  "Many sports now know that someone is looking over their shoulder," the 77-year-old Canadian told AFP.  WADA has documented more than 1,000 Russian doping cases across dozens of sports, most notably at the Winter Olympics that Russia hosted in Sochi in 2014.  The country was found guilty of a government-organized effort to mask samples from athletes using banned substances between 2011 and 2015.  Russia's Athletics Federation has been banned form international competition since 2015.  RUSADA was also suspended in 2015.  New revelations appeared in September when electronic data from the former Moscow laboratory was suspected of having been manipulated when it was handed to WADA investigators earlier in the year.  Consequently, Russia could face a ban from the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.  The latest allegations are still being  investigated and no decision on Russia is expected in Katowice.  Witold Banka, who will formally be elected to replace Reedie later this week at WADA's board meeting, promised he would not tolerate cheating or manipulations.  "The new future of anti-doping starts today," Banka, a former sprinter who helped Poland win a bronze medal in the 4x400 meters relay at the 2007 World Championships, told the Katowice conference.  The president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach, pledged $10 million to fight doping in sports, saying half of the money will go toward storing samples from pre-Olympic testing for 10 years while the rest will fund investigations and research.  Hundreds of doping samples from the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 Games have been reanalyzed with improved methods, resulting in more than 120 positive tests.  With reporting by ESPN, dpa, AFP, Reuters, and AP


rferl--2019-11-22--Russian Athletes Again Face Possible Olympic Ban After WADA Panel Ruling

Russia is again facing an Olympic ban after a key World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) committee recommended that Russia’s anti-doping agency be declared noncompliant.      WADA on November 22 said its Compliance Review Committee (CRC) has sent a recommendation that the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) once again be suspended when the global anti-doping watchdog's executive committee meets on December 9 in Paris.      If ruled noncompliant by the executive committee, Russia could be excluded from next year's Summer Olympics in Tokyo, along with facing other sanctions.      Under rules set in place following the Russian doping scandal that marred the Sochi Olympics in 2014, the Russians could appeal any penalty to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.      The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is required to abide by the decisions from WADA or the court – although IOC President Thomas Bach said this week he was not in favor of a total ban.      Rules state that in the case of a “critical” violation by a country, “The athletes...representing that country...will be excluded from participation in or attendance at the Olympic Games...for the next edition of that event, or until reinstatement (whichever is longer).”      At the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games in South Korea, Russia was barred from competing as a country, but the IOC permitted nearly 170 Russian athletes to participate as independents, and it remains possible a similar arrangement could be made for the Tokyo Olympics, which begin July 24.      The world watchdog in September reopened compliance proceedings after it said it found inconsistencies in the massive bank of historical testing data finally handed over in January.      Earlier on November 22, the World Athletics Council (WAC) said it was putting on hold the read-mission process of the Russian Athletics Federation (RUSAF) a day after several top RUSAF officials were suspended.      The WAC, formerly known as the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), is the world governing body for track and field athletes, cross country running, and other related events.      Rune Andersen, chairman of the World Athletics task force overseeing RUSAF’s reinstatement, made the announcement following a meeting in Monaco.      RUSAF was banned from international competitions in November 2015 after a state-sponsored doping scandal came to light, although some athletes under certain conditions have been allowed to compete in some events as neutrals.      The WAC decision comes a day after RUSAF president Dmitry Shlyakhtin and several other officials were suspended by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) for serious breaches of antidoping rules, adding to the federation's woes ahead of next year's Olympics.      The AIU, which oversees integrity issues in global athletics including doping, said the provisional suspensions were linked to an investigation into whereabouts violations committed by Russian high jumper Danil Lysenko, which they said the officials had obstructed.      It said the suspensions of seven people including Shlyakhtin, executive director Alexander Parkin, Lysenko and his coach Yevgeny Zagorulko came after it concluded federation officials "had been involved in the provision of false explanations and forged documents to the AIU in order to explain whereabouts failures by the athlete."      World Athletics President Sebastian Coe said the group was considering stripping Russia's membership, adding that “we need to deal with renegade factions like this.”    With reporting by AP, AFP, Reuters, and dpa


sottnet--2019-11-26--Rank Russophobia: WADA panel recommends ALL Russian athletes receive FOUR-YEAR BAN from ALL sporting

Rank Russophobia: WADA panel recommends ALL Russian athletes receive FOUR-YEAR BAN from ALL sporting competitions

A key panel of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) recommends Russia be hit withover noncompliance with the World Anti-Doping Code.that were obtained by the agency from a Moscow laboratory in January. WADA's Executive Committee will consider the recommendation and proposed consequences on December 9, asaid.The country was officially banned from the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, but a number of Russian athletes were allowed to compete as neutrals under the Olympic flag.WADA has documented more than 1,000 Russian doping cases across dozens of sports, most notably at the Winter Olympics that Russia hosted in Sochi in 2014. The country was found guilty of a government-organized effort to mask samples from athletes using banned substances between 2011 and 2015. Full disclosure of data from the Moscow lab was a key condition of Russia's controversial reinstatement by WADA in September 2018.." It said data on "hundreds" of positive tests have been removed while "underlying raw data and PDF files have been deleted or altered."Besides a ban from major sporting competition, the committee recommendedRussia can appeal any sanctions to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.RUSAF's suspension is still in place, andand said itThe announcement came after RUSAF President Dmitry Shlyakhtin and several other officials were provisionally suspended over breaches of anti-doping rules. Shlyakhtin latersaying the scandal around the federation "discredits all of Russian sport, inflicts colossal reputational damage on our country as a whole, and undermines the foundations of the Olympic movement's integrity.""If this recommendation will not be taken into account, we will consider the question of the membership of the athletics federation in the Russian Olympic Committee at our next executive committee meeting," Stanislav Pozdnyakov said in a statement.


sottnet--2019-11-26--There is a desire to force us into constant defense: Lavrov weighs in on possible WADA ban for Russi

There is a desire to force us into constant defense: Lavrov weighs in on possible WADA ban for Russian athletes

Russia's foreign minister has spoken out about a possible ban for the country's athletes from international competition by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), reminding thatSergey Lavrov made his statement shortly after the Kremlin announced it has no plans to hold a discussion with the leaders of Russia's athletic federations on a possible four-year ban from WADA.The Compliance Review Committee (CRC) of the world doping watchdog has recommended the suspension over alleged tampering with data of the Russian national anti-doping agency.WADA's leadership is to take a decision on how to proceed on December 9. Some Russian media reported that a high-level meeting of Russian sports officials will be gathered at the Kremlin to discuss the case. But Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for the Russian president's office, told journalists on Tuesday that the reports were not true.The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said it will support "the toughest sanctions" against any person found responsible for manipulating the Russia data, but will need further evaluation before deciding on its course of action. However, the IOC supported WADA's suggestion that clean Russian athletes should be allowed to compete if they demonstrate they are personally "not implicated in any way by the non-compliance."


sottnet--2019-12-09--BEST OF THE WEB: The West's cultural war against Russia continues: WADA bans Russia for 4 years from

BEST OF THE WEB: The West's cultural war against Russia continues: WADA bans Russia for 4 years from international competition

Russia has been handed a four-year ban from major sporting events, including the Olympics and football World Cup, after the Executive Committee of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) approved sanctions on Monday.Meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, the 12-member WADA Executive Committee voted unanimously for measures against Russia earlier recommended by the organization's Compliance Committee.The data was handed over as part of the reinstatement terms for RUSADA after a three-year exile over claims of state-sponsored doping, which Russia has consistently denied.RUSADA was again declared non-compliant on Monday and will be suspended for a four-year period, meaningas the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is a signatory to the WADA Code.The Russian flag will also not be allowed at the next football World Cup in Qatar in 2022, should Russia qualify for the finals, as well as world championships in other sports.It has already been reported that the UEFA European Championships - four games of which will be held in St. Petersburg - and the 2021 UEFA Champions League final, held in the same city, will be unaffected by the latest WADA measures as they are continental events.Major doping allegations involving Russia first broke out after it topped the medal table at the 2014 Olympics on home soil in Sochi.A probe, headed by Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren, was launched into claims that Russia had operated a state-sponsored doping campaign, although no definitive proof of the allegations has ever been provided.RUSADA was initially declared non-compliant in November 2015, while the Russian track-and-field team faced a blanket ban from the 2016 Rio Summer Games.Russian athletes were only allowed to compete at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang under neutral status, although the IOC lifted its ban on the country as the Games came to a close.Rodchenkov remained in charge of the laboratory despite receiving psychiatric care. He fled to the US along with several colleagues, turning whistleblowers as the claims against Russia emerged.Independent experts in Russia recently concluded that the Moscow anti-doping laboratory database was tampered with during at least a six-month period, between November 2015 and June 2016, by Rodchenkov and other colleagues when they were already in the US.Perhaps unsurprisingly, one of the biggest champions of stringent measures against Russia has been Travis Tygart, the head of the US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA). He has called for a ban on all Russian athletes from competition, even as neutrals.After the latest news, Russian athletes across all sports will now wait anxiously to see how widely the WADA sanctions are implemented.


sottnet--2019-12-11--Absolute power: How WADA became the judge, jury and executioner of world sports

Genie out of the bottle  Russia's four-year sporting ban has demonstrated the extent of the World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) ability to decide the fate of entire nations in the world of sport. How did a single bureaucracy gain such absolute power?Earlier this week, WADA banned Russia from hosting or competing in international sporting events for four years, over alleged manipulation of data from the Moscow anti-doping laboratory. The ban covers next summer's Olympics in Japan and the FIFA 2022 World Cup in Qatar. It will affect thousands of professional athletes who never took any banned substances and only dreamed to win in a jersey with the Russian flag while their national anthem plays.Russians will still be able to compete at international sports events as neutrals, but only if they get WADA approval - meaning that they now have to prove their innocence. Moscow called the WADA decision politically motivated "collective punishment" and is now preparing to challenge it at the top sports court.WADA owes its existence to the Lausanne Declaration , adopted in 1999 at the first World Conference on Doping in Sport spearheaded by the International Olympic Committee. The conference itself was largely a result of a massive doping scandal that rocked the sports world the previous year. At that time, several prominent professional cycling teams were caught doping, not as a result of then-existing drugs tests but thanks to police raids.Shattered by the doping revelations and tired of the existing chaotic doping prevention system's inability to effectively fight cheating in sports, the IOC pleaded for the creation of a new universal body to lead and coordinate this work.This plea was heard, and several months later led to the creation of WADA, an "independent International Anti-Doping Agency" granted unprecedented authority ranging from "expanding out-of-competition testing" and "coordinating research" of doping substances to "harmonizing scientific and technical standards" of anti-doping measures all over the world.In the following years, the international community was still apparently fascinated by its dream of creating a sort of a God of fair sports - a body capable of sorting out all the doping problems on its own, while being free from any outside influence.As a result, both sports organizations and national governments consistently focused on making WADA as independent as possible, while apparently paying much less attention to such things as the body's internal transparency.The code was broadly accepted by the international and national sports bodies, which apparently sought some clear guidelines in this field. It was adopted in 2003 and eventually signed by most international sports bodies and national sports federations, Olympic committees and anti-doping agencies, making WADA the virtual custodian of this anti-doping Bible.A 2005 International Convention against Doping in Sport, adopted by UNESCO and eventually ratified by 180 states, formalized the Code rules for the governments, thus putting them under sort of moral pressure in terms of complying with the system essentially created by WADA.Yet as WADA powers grew, so did the concerns about its suspected lack of transparency and flawed methods.This fact did not escape the attention of some scientists, including Erik Boye, a renowned Norwegian cell biologist and professor emeritus at the Institute for Biosciences of the University of Oslo.Meanwhile, the only existing way for the affected athletes - and entire nations for that matter - to dispute WADA's decisions has been the Court of Arbitration for Sport. However, the CAS does not control WADA in any way, but simply handles the disputes between the agency and those it considered to be in violation of its anti-doping rules.Even then, the court is in WADA's power to some extent, at least according to Boye and those that share his view.By giving the agency a growing number of powers over the past few decades, the world of sports has unwittingly found itself entangled in its web. As WADA has arguably grown too powerful and unaccountable, neither the international sports bodies nor the national governments managed to create an effective oversight body.The consequences were not long in coming.In 2017, the agency has seemingly tightened its grip on the sports world by linking the World Anti-Doping Code to its internally adopted regulation detailing the sanctions against any potential "non-compliant" entities.In the blink of an eye, the foundation of the international anti-doping system that was once signed by some 660 sports bodies from all over the world - and later amended by a no less representative third World Conference on Doping in Sport - was changed by WADA's own Foundation Board, to make it easier for the agency to go after suspected cheats, as one media outlet put it.The board is of course supposed to represent the interests of each and every sports-related body around the world, as it is also formed in accordance with a complex system involving quotas for IOC, athletes and national authorities - but an approval by 38 people is in no way equal to support of hundreds of national and international sports organizations.Thus the document dubbed International Standard for Code Compliance by Signatories was declared "a mandatory International Standard that forms an essential part of the World Anti-Doping Program" by WADA. Some of the measures envisioned by it were then promptly applied to Russia, setting a precedent for WADA virtually banishing an entire nation from international sports.The sanctions against Russia, as severe as they are, might not in fact be the harshest ones possible. The WADA document certainly does not hold back when describing various forms of punishment, including partial and total bans for a nation to participate in international sporting events and even nothing less than "suspension of recognition by the Olympic Movement and/or of membership of the Paralympic Movement."It may well turn out that the sporting fate of entire nations will depend on the 38 members of WADA's Foundation Board, or the even less representative 12-member executive committee - as there is simply no one out there who can oversee, much less override, their decisions.


sottnet--2019-12-24--NATO using WADA and doping claims to contain Russia - Lavrov

The persecution of Russia by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is politically motivated as the body remains in the hands of NATO member states who won't shy away from any means to harm Moscow, Russian FM Sergey Lavrov has said."When the whole pathos of fighting against doping is used to support the voice of."Earlier in December, WADA slapped Russia with harsh sanctions over the alleged manipulations with the database of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory it had received from the country's doping watchdog, RUSADA, as part of its reinstatement process.RUSADA was labeled non-compliant, with Russia being barred from major sporting events for the next four years. The country's athletes would only be able to complete internationally under a neutral flag, of course, if they manage to prove that they are clean.Moscow had vigorously denied the accusations and voiced plans to appeal the ban in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).Earlier this week, Russia's Investigative Committee announced the result of its probe into the alleged meddling with the Moscow laboratory's files. It said the database had been accessed remotely by the lab's former head, Grigory Rodchenkov, who fled to the US in 2015 and became WADA's main witness in the case against Russia. The investigators also revealed that Rodchenkov had provided WADA with "a sort of an alternative archive of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory," the origin and the content of which remain unknown.


sputnik--2019-11-26--Russia to Seek Frank Dialogue With WADA - Foreign Minister

Mr Lavrov's comment comes following the recommendation of the World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) Compliance Committee to ban Russia from applying to host international competitions for four years. WADA will review the recommendation at the executive committee meeting on 9 December. If the anti-doping watchdog approves the recommendation, Russia will be banned from the next summer Olympics in Tokyo, the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing, as well as from the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.  In 2015, WADA opened compliance proceedings against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) over accusations of a large-scale state-funded doping scheme involving thousands of athletes, coaches and sports officials. Russia denied the allegations but the country's athletes had to compete under the Olympic flag at the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. In September 2018, the ban was lifted but RUSADA was required to offer WADA access to the database of Russian athlete records.  In September 2019 another non-compliance procedure was launched against RUSADA over suspected data manipulation. Russia was given three weeks to explain "inconsistencies" found in probes previously received from the Russian laboratories. Moscow submitted its answers to the agency in early October. After examining the data provided by Moscow, WADA said that some of the records had likely been 'altered.'


tass--2019-09-24--FIFA UEFA and WADA have no complaints in regard to Russian Football Union

FIFA, UEFA and WADA have no complaints in regard to Russian Football Union

MOSCOW, September 24. /TASS/. The world’s governing football body, FIFA, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has no complaints at all in regard to the Russian Football Union (RFU), Kirill Melnikov, the RFU director of communications, told TASS on Tuesday.  "As far as we know the current issues on the agenda are addressed to anti-doping structures, which are operating on the territory of Russia," Melnikov said.  "There are no complaints at all in regard to the Russian Football Union on behalf of FIFA, UEFA and WADA," he continued. "We hope that the Russian sport will be represented at international tournaments without any restrictions."  WADA announced on Monday that it had initiated a probe into the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) with the Code of the world’s governing anti-doping body based on the reported inconsistencies, discovered in the data from the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory. WADA also informed the Russian side that it had a three-week time to provide explanations on the issue.  Specialists from WADA were granted access to the database of the Moscow Anti-Doping Laboratory in January this year and copied 24 terabytes of information on Russian athletes’ doping samples collected between 2012 and 2015. WADA experts finished their work to retrieve doping samples from the Moscow Lab on April 30 having collected 2,262 doping samples in 4,524 containers (Samples A and B).  The WADA Executive Committee reinstated the compliance status of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) on September 20, 2018 on condition that WADA experts would be granted access before December 31, 2018 to doping samples at the Moscow Anti-Doping Lab, which was sealed off in connection with a federal investigation.


tass--2019-11-15--Russian, WADA experts talk changes in Moscow lab database

MOSCOW, November 15. /TASS/. Russian experts have had a meeting with representatives of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) on November 14 to discuss the alterations discovered in the database of the Moscow laboratory, a source close to the meeting told TASS.  Earlier, the Russian side provided answers to each of the 31 question WADA has in light of the changes detected. The meeting was supposed to give experts an opportunity to again share opinions on the issue.  Based on the meeting’s outcomes, the experts will prepare a report for the WADA Compliance Review Committee. The document should lay groundwork for future recommendations to the WADA Executive Committee regarding any potential sanctions imposed against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA).