IOC ignores ruling of world’s top sport tribunal, bans cleared Russians from Olympics
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has ignored a ruling by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on the eligibility of 15 Russians to compete in the upcoming winter games in South Korea, saying it has additional evidence to maintain a ban on the athletes over their involvement in doping.
The IOC said in a statement on Monday that a Thursday ruling by the Swiss-based CAS was not enough for the body to consider the Russian athletes, who had been banned from the Pyeongchang Winter Games, due to start on Friday, over doping suspicions, clean.
The statement said “the decision of the CAS had not lifted the suspicion of doping, or given the panel sufficient confidence to recommend ... those 13 athletes could be considered as clean.”
It added that the integrity of the 13 Russian athletes and the two coaches was still in question as the IOC had “additional elements and/or evidence” that included “traces of prohibited substances and evidence of steroid profile manipulation.”
It said the two coaches were ineligible as previous evidence available to the IOC showed they “should not be considered for an invitation.”
The Kremlin regretted the IOC decision to keep the ban in place, saying the CAS ruling should be enough to exonerate the athletes of doping suspicions.
“We're convinced that the CAS ruling has proved that such suspicions had no grounds,” said Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, adding, “We very much regret it. We expected that the CAS decision would dispel all suspicions against the athletes.”
Russia says the CAS ruling means the 15 athletes could be present in Pyeongchang.
A total of 169 Russian athletes will compete in the games as neutral. Authorities and some athletes said they were planning more legal action against the IOC over its rejection of the CAS ruling.
The IOC and other global sports bodies have accused the Russian government of running a systematic doping network involving athletes and coaches over the past years. Moscow denies there has been any state-sponsored scheme in place and says the allegations are politically-motivated.
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