17 national anti-doping agencies call for Russia ban

TIL Desk Sports/ Seventeen national anti-doping agencies have called for Russia to be banned from the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics over “one of the biggest doping scandals in sports history”.

In a statement issued at the end of a two-day meeting in Denver, Colorado yesterday, officials charged the International Olympic Committee had failed to hold Russia accountable despite evidence of widespread state-sponsored doping over a wide array of sports.

Russian track and field athletes were barred from the Rio Olympics last year and from the athletics World Championships in London last month. But the IOC declined to issue a blanket ban of Russia from the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

Officials at this week’s meeting, including representatives of anti-doping organizations from the United States, France, Germany and Britian, insisted an IOC lack of action on Russia “imperils clean athletes and the future of the Olympic movement”.

“A country’s sport leaders and organizations should not be given credentials to the Olympics when they intentionally violate the rules and rob clean athletes. This is especially unfair when athletes are punished when they violate the rules,” the statement said.