Olympic doping ban looms for Russia after WADA panel ruling

The prospect of Russia being banned from next year's Tokyo Olympics moved a step closer as the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) recommended the country's drug-testing authority be declared non-compliant, with charges racking up against Russia and the clock ticking ahead of next July's Games.

WADA said in Canada overnight Friday its Compliance Review Committee (CRC) recommended the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) be suspended again when the global watchdog meets in Paris on December 9.

If WADA chiefs adopt the recommendation, Russia faces severe sanctions including a possible ban from the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

Russia's anti-doping chief Yury Ganus described the ruling as fair and expected.

"The compliance decision was contingent on two demands. These were met formally but not properly," Ganus said.

The CRC issued its recommendation after asking Russia to explain "inconsistencies" in laboratory data handed over by Moscow to WADA investigators in January.

Full disclosure of data from the Moscow laboratory was a key condition of Russia's controversial reinstatement by WADA in September 2018.

RUSADA had been suspended over revelations of a vast, state-backed doping regime which including a systematic conspiracy to switch tainted samples at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.

The United States Anti-Doping Agency, which was sharply critical of WADA's decision to lift its suspension and reinstate RUSADA, called for a lengthy ban following Friday's announcement.

"Anything less than a four-year sanction for this critical violation that includes aggravating circumstances following years of denial and deceit would be another injustice in a long line of many for clean athletes," USADA chief executive Travis Tygart said in emailed comments to AFP.

Friday's development is the latest twist to a saga which exploded in 2015, when an independent WADA commission investigating allegations of Russian doping said it had found evidence of a vast state-supported conspiracy stretching back years.

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It was not due to "the quality of RUSADA's work," he said, adding: "It's a purely technical decision... conditions were not met whose implementation was not up to us."
Ganus insisted RUSADA officials had not been responsible for falsifying the data, insisting his staff "had nothing to do with the database and its transfer."