The world governing body for track and field, the IAAF, has voted to uphold a 2015 ban imposed against Russia over widespread state-sponsored doping until Russia meets key conditions.
The vote by the Council of the International Association of Athletics Federations on December 4 came after IAAF administrators heard a report and recommendations by a task force it formed to monitor Russian progress toward meeting conditions for reinstatement.
Rune Andersen, head of the IAAF's Russia task force, said Russian authorities had to grant access to data from testing samples at a Moscow laboratory from 2011 to 2015 so that the IAAF and other sports concerned can determine whether suspicious findings reported in the laboratory’s data base should be further investigated.
Andersen said Russia also must pay costs incurred by the IAAF as a result of the Russian doping scandal – including the costs of the IAAF Russia task force.
RUSAF was banned by the IAAF in November 2015 after a study commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) found that the use of performance-enhancing drugs by athletes in Russia was systemic and state-sponsored.
To be reinstated, the IAAF has said Russia also must acknowledge the findings of that report – including an admission that doping in Russia was state-sponsored.
Russia has accepted that doping has been widespread, but authorities in Moscow continue to deny any of it was state sponsored.
In September, WADA reinstated Russia in a controversial decision made on condition that Russia recognize the findings of its report and allow access to RUSADA’s stored test samples.
WADA has warned that failure to provide access to all of the data from RUSADA’s Moscow lab by the end of 2018 could lead to another suspension.
WADA experts were given access to the Moscow drug-testing laboratory for the first time last week.
Russian sports officials said on December 4 that a team of WADA experts plans to return to Moscow next week to conduct an audit of RUSADA.
