The IAAF "will hear reports from its taskforce into Russia’s anti-doping progress at its council meeting" in Vienna on June 17, according to the PA. Russia "was suspended" by the IAAF last November after being accused of "state-sponsored" doping. A five-strong IAAF taskforce, headed by former WADA Dir Rune Andersen, "is monitoring Russia’s progress on anti-doping, and will report back to the governing body at the 204th IAAF Council Meeting," which has now been confirmed for June 17.
Under proposals from the Russian ministry of sport, "all track and field athletes intending to compete at Rio will undergo a minimum of three independent, externally administered anti-doping controls before the Olympic Games" (PA, 4/21).
BACK ON THE ICE: REUTERS' Dmitriy Rogovitskiy wrote Russian Skating Union President Alexei Kravtsov said that the Int'l Skating Union "lifted a temporary ban imposed on three Russian athletes after they tested positive for the drug meldonium." The athletes "are five-time world champion speed skater Pavel Kulizhnikov, Olympic short-track speed skating Gold Medalist Semion Elistratov and 2015 European short-track champion Ekaterina Konstantinova."
Kravtsov said, "The temporary suspension has been lifted and the sportsmen will be able to train and compete in events" (REUTERS, 4/21).
IMPORTANT PRECEDENT: In Sydney, Linda Pearce wrote Tennis Australia President Steve Healy said that the Court of Arbitration for Sport's verdict in the Australian Football League side Essendon drug case "could act as an important precedent in Maria Sharapova's bid for clemency after her positive Australian Open test for meldonium." Healy, a Sydney-based partner with law firm Gadens, said he believed a suspension -- the maximum penalty is four years -- was inevitable on the basis of "strict liability" for Sharapova.
But Healy believes that whether or not Sharapova disclosed her meldonium use during the drug-testing process will be "a critical factor" in the length of her penalty.
Healy: "If she had disclosed it, I think she'd actually get some sympathy because you'd say 'OK, pretty bad error in December or even before that not to have picked it up, but she wasn't trying to hide it, she actually acknowledged it herself,' and I think that would go to penalty" (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD, 4/21).
