Russian athletes are set to be banned from the World Indoor Championships next year after it was announced that a review of its anti-doping programme would not be completed until the end of March.
All Russian athletes have been provisionally banned from international competition following the doping scandal detailed in a report commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) which was published last week.
A team of IAAF inspectors will start work next year to decide whether the necessary measures have been taken to allow Russia to be re-admitted to the governing body.
Russia’s anti-doping agency (RUSADA) has been declared non-compliant with the international code as the fall-out from last week’s extraordinary report which found the country had operated a systematic, state-sponsored doping programme continues.
An IAAF statement announced the timetable for the inspection team, saying: “It is planned that the inspection team mission will commence the verification process no later than January 1, 2016 with a first report back at the earliest to the IAAF council at their meeting in Cardiff on March 27 2016.”
The World Indoor Championships are scheduled for March 17-20 in Portland, Oregon, a week before the inspection team will make its first report.
The IAAF has also drawn up a list of proposed targets that the Russian athletics federation (ARAF) must meet.
IAAF president Lord Coe said: “For the protection of all clean athletes there cannot be any timeframe for ARAF’s return until we are assured all criteria have been fully met and will continue to be met forever.
“The verification criteria must be robust otherwise the inspection process will fail. Repeating past failings which have brought ARAF to their current position is not an option. To succeed this process must guarantee a level playing field and thereby re-establish confidence in the integrity of competition.”
The proposed targets include:
* Identifying, investigating, suspending, sanctioning or excluding from ARAF all athletes, coaches, doctors, agents or administrators involved in doping.
* Establishing an effective anti-doping framework in Russia and ending the culture of silence to allow athletes to safely blow the whistle on wrongdoers.
* Proposing criminalising the distribution and trafficking of prohibited substances under Russian law.
* Implementing a new robust and transparent anti-doping testing programme.
* Satisfying WADA and the IAAF that its officials, coaches and athletes act in accordance with the world anti-doping code.
The IAAF council will discuss the proposed criteria at a meeting next week and then a plan will be drawn up to decide how the inspection team will carry out their work in Russia.
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