Russia Banned From 2020, 2022 Olympics Over Doping Scandal | Eastern North Carolina Now

Publisher's note: This informational nugget was sent to me by Ben Shapiro, who represents the Daily Wire, and since this is one of the most topical news events, it should be published on BCN.

The author of this post is Hank Berrien.

    On Monday, the World Anti-Doping Agency's executive committee voted to recommend banning Russia from the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo and the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

    As The Washington Post reported, "On Nov. 22, WADA's Compliance Review Committee recommended that the executive committee find the Russian Anti-Doping Agency in violation of the World Anti-Doping because of 'an extremely serious case of noncompliance with the requirement to provide an authentic copy of the Moscow data, with several aggravating features.'"

    The Daily Mail reported, "Russia's Anti Doping Agency (RUSADA) has 21 days to appeal against the ban, after the sanctions effectively strip the agency of its accreditation. RUSADA chief Yury Ganus branded the doping ban a 'tragedy' for clean Russian athletes and said there is 'no chance' of winning an appeal. If it does so, the appeal will be referred to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). But athletes untainted by the scandal will be allowed to compete independently under a neutral flag, as was the case during the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics."

    The Daily Mail had previously reported, "Even Russia's own anti-doping agency head, Yuri Ganus, has admitted he fears the worst after discovering that thousands of entries on a key database of athletes' test results had been doctored despite his calls to come clean. They (the sanctions) are to be expected and they are justified. It's a real tragedy for our sport.'

    Russian athletes have been stripped of over 30 Olympic medals since 2008. Russia's track and field athletes were not permitted to compete in the Rio Games in 2016.

    The Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) was reinstated in 2018 but it was supposed to supply data from the former Moscow Laboratory by the end of 2018. Russia missed the deadline.

    In response, WADA president Craig Reedie said, "I am bitterly disappointed that data extraction from the former Moscow Laboratory has not been completed by the date agreed by WADA's ExCo in September 2018. Since then, WADA has been working diligently with the Russian authorities to meet the deadline, which was clearly in the best interest of clean sport. The process agreed by WADA's ExCo in September will now be initiated."

    After they supplied the data in January 2019, investigators found some anomalies. The Post reports that investigators say the Russians "planted fabricated evidence" in an alleged attempt to implicate Grigory Rodchenkov, a whistleblower who was the head of the Moscow lab.

    Reedie said, "The intelligence and investigations team have produced very compelling evidence that there was manipulation and deletion of items of data. Having extracted the data and done all the work on it, it's very disappointing to discover someone had tampered with it."

    The New York Times commented: "Whispers of systemic doping in Russia at the start of the decade led to revelations of a huge doping program, which led to more revelations and serious punishments, which led to a brokered deal that allowed Russians to compete in the Rio and Pyeongchang Games, which led to the latest attempted cover-up, which has led to the current calls for more draconian punishments- like the global ban WADA will vote on when it meets Monday."