Bach voices determination to combat doping

LAUSANNE: International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach launched a fresh appeal on Tuesday to protect world sports from doping scandals and corrupt practices after recent damaging revelations.

Russia has been thrown into the spotlight after widespread doping was revealed throughout their athletics team and they now face a possible ban from the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

“We must do everything we can to protect these millions of clean athletes around the world,” said Bach who won a team fencing gold medal at the 1976 Games in Montreal for Germany.

“For their sake and for the credibility of sports competition, they have to be protected from doping and corrupting influences.

“We also have to protect the credibility of sports competition from match-fixing and manipulation. The IOC has created a specific 20-million US dollar fund for the protection of clean athletes.

The statement from Bach, issued ahead of an IOC executive committee meeting due to discuss the governance of sports organisations, said that the IOC maintained a zero-tolerance policy against doping and any kind of manipulation and corruption.

“Doped athletes already face a four-year ban from any kind of sports competition for their first infringement. “This means an effective ban from the next edition of the Olympic Games. As a young man, I called for life bans even for the first infringement.

“What we can do is making the anti-doping system more independent from sports organisations. In this respect, the IOC took the initiative to ask the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the international authority in the fight against drugs in sport, to consider taking over testing programmes from the international sports federations.” added Bach.