World Anti-Doping Agency recommends Russia should be banned from athletics

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Doping scandal hits athletics.

THE report by the World Anti-Doping Agency, which has investigated allegations of doping and cover-ups in athletics, has concluded that Russia should receive a ban from the sport.

The findings, which have caused upheavals across the sporting world, reveal that the London 2012 Olympic Games were “sabotaged” by the participation of athletes under suspicion of doping.

The report found evidence of a “state-sponsored” doping programme in Russia and said that five athletes and five coaches should receive lifetime doping bans. 

Speaking at a press conference Dick Pound, the commission´s chairman, gave the further recommendation that Russia should be banned from the 2016 Olympics,

“One of our hopes is they will volunteer to take the remedial work,” he said. “If they don’t the outcome may be no Russian track and field athletes in Rio. I hope they recognise it is time to change.”

Richard McLaren, co-author of the report, has said that the cheating represents “a different scale of corruption” even in comparison with the FIFA scandal in football.

The world governing body for sport, IAFF, has also been implicated in the findings and their president, Lord Coe, expressed his shock and said, “I want to see a sport that is responsible and transparent and accountable and I will do anything it takes to achieve that. But this will not be swift road, this will be tough.”

Tracey Couch, the UK´s sports minister, called the report an “extraordinarily dark day for athletics”.

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