Former IAAF chief charged over doping corruption

“Diack and Cisse were arrested on Sunday and released on Tuesday, after being interrogated by police officers and judges”.

Lamine Diack, the former head of the worldwide Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) was placed under formal investigation in France on Wednesday on suspicion of corruption and money laundering, prosecutors said. The ethics committee said an investigation was continuing in respect of a fifth person, whose name would be confirmed if subsequently charged.

The WADA report added that Diack’s two sons, Pape Massata Diack and Khalil Diack, were alleged to have asked for 460 000 euros from Turkey’s 1500m women’s Olympic champion Asli Cakir Alptekin in November 2012, but she refused.

“It was a sort of blackmail”, Houlette said.

Earlier this week, Nikita Kamaev of Russia’s anti-doping agency RUSADA said in an interview with the Russian R-Sport news agency that his organisation was ready to help French investigators if contacted.

The IAAF Ethics Commission also said they had liaised with WADA over their investigation.

The others charged were Valentin Balakhnichev, former president of the All-Russia Athletic Federation and a former IAAF treasurer, Alexei Melnikov, ex-Russian coach for long-distance walkers and runners, and Gabriel Dolle, former director of the IAAF’s Anti-Doping Department.

“We have already said that there were problems with our federation, but the old management are no longer working there”, he said.

“Because the investigations have just started, we can not affirm that all this money came from payments from Russian athletes”, she said.

He served as president from 1999 until August this year when he was succeeded by Briton Coe who ran on a platform to reform athletics and improve its integrity. With football officials at FIFA also facing criminal probes in the United States and Switzerland, two of the most powerful governing bodies, supposed guardians for two of the most popular sports, are now operating under dark clouds. “We express full confidence in the new leadership of the IAAF which has repeatedly declared that it is in full alignment with the call for good governance in sport and the protection of the clean athletes”.

An IAAF statement said: “The IAAF confirms that, emanating from separate ongoing investigations by Wada’s independent commission and the IAAF’s own independent Ethics Commission into allegations surrounding its anti-doping rules and regulations, a French police investigation has now commenced. They deserve to be honored at a time when the situation will be restored”.