Dope cheats will not be spared, promises Olympic boss Bach
International Olympic Committee president looks on during a press conference after the 128th International Olympic Committee session in Kuala Lumpur on Monday. (Photo: AFP)
Kuala Lumpur: IOC president Thomas Bach on Monday vowed “zero tolerance” for any Olympics athletics results tainted by doping, but the head of world athletics said new revelations were part of a campaign to “redistribute” medals.
Allegations of mass doping made by German broadcaster ARD and the Sunday Times newspaper of Britain have plunged athletics into a new cheating crisis less than three weeks before the World Championships start in Beijing.
ARD and the Sunday Times obtained an athletics world body database that they said indicated up to one third of medals involving endurance events at World Championships and Olympics from 2001 to 2012 were won by competitors who have given suspicious doping tests.
“If there should be cases involving results at Olympic Games, the IOC will act with zero tolerance with our usual policy,” Bach said in Kuala Lumpur.
International Association of Athletics Federations president Lamine Diack told an IOC meeting that the world body would answer the allegations.
“Behind all this there is a desire to redistribute medals, take care of this,” Diack, who will stand down as IAAF president this month, warned IOC members. It is the second time in seven months that the IAAF has been thrown onto the defensive by doping.
( Source : AFP )
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