The International Olympic Committee on Tuesday ruled
in favor of the temporary suspension of one of the Committee’s honorary members
and former president of the International Association of Athletics Federations
(IAAF) Lamine Diack. Diack’s suspension is linked with the scandal triggered by
several top-flight Russian athletes’ positive doping tests. 82-year old Lamine
Diack of Senegal, who was at the helm of IAAF until August 2015, is accused of
having accepted to cover up positive doping tests of Russian athletes. Also,
Diack has been charged by the French judiciary with passive corruption and money laundering.
The scandal triggered by
the positive doping tests of Russian athletes has occurred less that an year
ahead of the Olympic Games in Rio. Among the targeted athletes are Marina
Savinova and Ekaterina Poistogova, two Russian athletes who reaped gold ands
silver, respectively, at the London Olympics in 2012, in the 800 m event. The novelty of the charges this time lies with the intricate way in
which athletes’ positive doping tests intertwined with charges of corruption
targeting Russian Federation’s sports and government officials.
The report the
World Anti-Doping Agency presented earlier this week exposed the way in which
Russian sports officials, as well as IAAF officials systematically covered up
doping practices and positive doping tests. Moreover, the anti-doping lab in
Moscow has been accused of having destroyed more than 1,000 urine and blood
samples. The World Anti-Doping Agency has announced the closing, with immediate
effect, of the laboratory in Moscow and has also called for unprecedented sanctions in this case. Among
other things, Russia is banned from all
athletics competitions, including the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.
As expected,
Russian authorities have denied the evidence laid out by the World Anti Doping
Agency Even the Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov was very keen on expressing
his view on the issue, speaking about the lack of evidence pertaining to the
case in point. However, specific elements are expected to crop up along the
way. According to a World Anti-Doping
Agency press release, in the interim, samples analysed by the
Moscow Anti-doping Centre shall be transported securely, promptly and with a
demonstrable chain of custody to another WADA-accredited laboratory.
According to the same source, samples will be sealed, in order to secure their
perfect preservation.