Part two of Richard McLaren's report
for the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) into doping problems in
Russian sport, which was released on 9th December, has clarified the
conclusions reached in part one, which was made public in July.
Analyzed the new release, IOF keeps its statement on the case and
“has full confidence in Russian orienteering athletes and IOF event
organizers”.
A second investigation commissioned by
the World Anti-Doping Agency has revealed that more than 1,000
athletes were involved in a state-run doping system in Russia. The
findings come in the second part of an investigation by Canadian
lawyer Richard McLaren, who announced the results of his inquiry in
London on Friday. His second report – which comes after WADA
extended his mandate in July – confirmed the findings of the first
report while revealing more about a system of covering up tests that
was refined over time.
“The results of the forensic and
laboratory analysis initiated by my team established the conspiracy
that was perpetrated between 2011 and 2015,” McLaren said. “It is
impossible to know how deep and how far back a conspiracy goes. For
years, international sports competitions have unknowingly been
hijacked by the Russians. Coaches and athletes have been playing on
an uneven field. Sports fans and spectators have been deceived.”
Most notably, he said more than 1,000 Russian Olympians and
Paralympians – in summer and winter sports – were identified “as
being involved in or benefiting from manipulation to conceal positive
doping tests.”
How did it start?
Yuliya Stepanova, a Russian middle-distance
runner, together with her husband, Vitaly Stepanov, who worked for
Russia’s anti-doping agency from 2008 to 2011, spoke out in 2014
about a sophisticated, state-run doping system within Russia. The
couple’s detailed accusations set off a series of investigations
and additional whistle-blower accounts that have roiled global
sports. She told the German public broadcaster ARD that she had been
extorted and pressured to take drugs, and she provided recordings
suggesting she was far from alone. The Stepanovs fled Russia in 2014,
and they are living in the United States. The report also follows on
charges made by Grigory Rodchenkov, a laboratory director in Sochi.
Rodchenkov told the New York Times that he was ordered to replace
tainted urine samples provided by top Russian competitors with clean
ones.
The World Anti-Doping Agency was
created in 1999 through a collective initiative led by the
International Olympic Committee (IOC). Its mandate is to promote,
co-ordinate and monitor the fight against drugs in sports. It is
headquartered in Montreal with regional offices in Europe, Africa,
Asia, Oceania and Latin America. It receives half of its funding from
the IOC and the rest from various national governments. The agency is
responsible for the World Anti-Doping Code, a document that aims to
harmonize anti-doping regulations in all sports and countries. It has
been adopted by more than 600 sports organizations as well as the IOC
and International Paralympic Committee. The code embodies an annually
updated list of prohibited substances. The agency has 34
WADA-accredited labs across the globe to conduct human doping-control
sample analyses. It also operates a centralized Web-based Anti-Doping
Administration & Management System that stores each athlete’s
lab results, whereabouts, therapeutic-use exemptions and rule
violations history.
Orienteering, a close-knit family
Immediately following the report, WADA
notified the International Federations that they would be receiving
gathered evidence for any cases pertaining to athletes within their
testing jurisdiction. The respective International Federations would
then take over the cases for potential disciplinary actions. On
Friday, 16th December, the International Orienteering Federation made
clear its position, sustaining its full confidence in both Russian
orienteering athletes and Russian IOF event organizers regarding
these matters: “Based upon the information received from WADA, the
IOF concludes that there is currently no evidence which indicates
that orienteering is involved in systematic doping in Russia as
reported by the McLaren report, and therefore sees no reason to
change the statements made in July/August 2016. Russian orienteering
athletes participation in IOF events is not restricted and is
welcomed”, can be read at the “IOF Statement regarding the
McLaren report part 2” [HERE].
On Monday, 12th December, the
International Orienteering Federation had already made public the
Anti-Doping Report 2016, making clear
that “during 2016, a total of 102 In-Competition Doping Controls
were performed by the IOF. The tests were spread over 10 different
IOF Major Events in SkiO, FootO, MTBO and TrailO. A total of 84
individual athletes were tested, representing 22 different
Nationalities. All but one of these tests produced a negative result.
This one test produced an Adverse Analytical Finding for a substance
which was covered by a Therapeutic Use Exemption granted to the
athlete in question by the IOF Medical Commission, and is therefore
not regarded as an Anti-Doping Rule Violation.”
WSOC 2017 in Krasnoyarsk is out of
risk
The possibility of withdrawing
Krasnoyarsk from the World Ski Orienteering Championships'
organization left the Ski Orienteering family on a verge of a nervous
breakdown. Also here, the IOF statement is quite clear: “IOF Events
planned to be organized in Russia will be completed as planned, and
applications for future events from organizers in Russia are welcomed
by the IOF. This decision means that the currently planned World Ski
Orienteering Championships in Krasnoyarsk, Russia 7th -12th March,
2017 will go ahead as planned.” On Facebook, the American Alexandra
Jospe's expressed her satisfaction by the way IOF is dealing with the
case: “I really appreciate the IOF doing everything it can to make
this a fair sport. You are not facing an easy decision here, and
hopefully whatever decision is made is not met with Internet-venom.
Thank you for your work!”, she said.
Looking on the subject also on
Facebook, the Former European and World Champion in Ski Orienteering,
the Russian Tatiana Rvacheva, goes even further: “I think that the
only thing that saves our sport from doping in Russia is that we are
not an Olympic sport. That's why athletes do orienteering, only
because they really love it, not because of money and something else.
During all my sport career I was really proud of our international
sport-family and our sport, because in Orienteering we don't have
doping, we can enjoy and win without it. All members from Russian
national team are training separately, we have never been part of the
system. I am pretty sure that McLaren report is a half truth and
there are a lot of politics, but I hope that this report will
initiate great changes in all Russian sport, and government will
allocate money for healthy way of life and opportunities to do sport,
not only for professional sport. I hope that this situation will
change mind of big amount of coaches and athletes who think about
which doping is more efficient but don't work too much to find
efficient methods of training. But the main thing for us is that
McLaren report is far away from the Orienteering World, really far
away. I hope we remain the same family with our principals of fair
play, our love to what we are doing. And I'm sure in Krasnoyarsk
everything will be in high level with fair winners. With a great love
to our sport.”
The McLaren Independent Investigation
Report (Part I and Part II) can be downloaded from the World
Anti-Doping Agency's website at
https://www.wada-ama.org/en/resources/doping-control-process/mclaren-independent-investigation-report-part-i
and
https://www.wada-ama.org/en/resources/doping-control-process/mclaren-independent-investigation-report-part-ii
Joaquim Margarido
