Russian Federation suspended by IAAF

The council for the I.A.A.F. voted for the suspension 22-1.

Russian Mikhail Butov, an IAAF council member and secretary general of the Russian Athletics Federation will “present the ARAF position” before being “excluded from the remainder of the debate and voting”, the IAAF said in a statement.

Hightower said she hoped the episode would lead to changes in the IAAF as well, saying she was in favor of the WADA recommendation of instituting an ombudsman and compliance officer.

“Our reaction is calm”, Mutko told The Associated Press.

Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said he is hopeful Russia will be able to compete at the world indoor championships in Portland, Oregon, from March 17-20.

Wada will release further details from its report later this year – there were redacted sections on the IAAF because of ongoing criminal investigations.

The suspension takes effect immediately, barring Russian athletes from all worldwide track and field events until the country can prove it has put its house in order. Russia has also complained that all Russian athletes should not be punished for the sins of a few.

WADA’s foundation board meets next Wednesday, when it is expected to suspend Russia’s Anti-Doping Agency as a whole.

President Vladimir Putin has also used sporting successes to promote his image of Russian Federation as a resurgent global power, portraying its hosting of a successful winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014 as a symbol of a newly confident nation. Neither of those qualities is what the IAAF needs in its leader. In November, the IAAF Council narrowly voted to award the 2019 Worlds to Doha over a Eugene bid bankrolled by Nike.

The move comes as a result of a World Anti-Doping Association (WADA) report earlier this week revealing findings by a commission that there is a systematic and pervasive doping culture in Russian sports that reaches to high levels of government.

“We may miss one or two competitions, but for athletes with clean consciences to miss the Olympics or a World Championships would be real stupidity”, he said in Moscow.

Even if Russia’s track and field team is banned, Mutko told the AP that the country has no intention of boycotting the Olympics.

Isinbayeva says “all my victories are honest, “clean” and deserved”. I have always followed and am following all the anti-doping rules precisely. “The situation the Russian national team is in now is very sad but I ask you not to treat all the athletes in the same negative way”.

“We have been dealing with the failure of [the All Russia Athletic Federation] and made the decision to provisionally suspend them, the toughest sanction we can apply at this time”, said Lord Coe, adding that the system had failed athletes not just in Russian Federation but around the world. Their report landed like a bomb on Monday, and on Tuesday WADA suspended the tainted Moscow lab at the heart of the investigation.