WADA To Consider Re-Suspending Russia After Missed Data Deadline

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) will hold a committee meeting on January 14 to weigh a potential re-suspension and other sanctions after Russia failed to meet a December 31 deadline for turning over anti-doping information.

Russia’s state anti-doping apparatus (RUSADA) had been suspended since 2016, but was controversially reinstated in the fall of 2018. That move by WADA came with widespread outside criticism from many groups and individuals who felt WADA placed too few requirements on Russia to regain compliance. One of those requrements, though, involved Russian officials turning over data from its Moscow anti-doping laboratory, which was at the center of many of the allegations that Russia had run a state-sponsored doping program for years.

The BBC reports that Russia did not turn over the data by December 31, and that WADA officials are now considering suspending Russia again. The head of RUSADA said the data had’t been turned over in a Dec. 27 letter published on the RUSADA website calling on Russian President Vladimir Putin to order Russian officials to turn over the data. In that letter, the RUSADA chief worried that if the country did not meet the deadline, Russia could see its athletes “suspended from participation in all international competitions” and “lose the right to hold international competitions on the territory of Russia.”

In the BBC report, WADA says it had already laid out a plan to follow should Russia not meet the terms of its reinstatement. That plan includes a Jan. 14 meeting of the compliance review committee, which will make a recommendation to WADA’s executive committee. Several high-ranking anti-doping officials are quoted in the BBC piece, mostly expressing disappointment – but not surprise – that Russia missed the deadline.

WADA vice president Linda Helleland said she was “extremely disappointed but not surprised” about the missed deadline and called for an immediate response from WADA. The U.K. Anti-Doping agency said that “Uninhibited access to the Moscow laboratory and the athlete ‘LIMS’ data, was the first condition of Wada’s reinstatement of Rusada in September 2018” and said it was “deeply concerned” that that condition was not met.

The United States Anti-Doping Agency’s president Travis Tygart was even more harsh, calling the development “a total joke and an embarrassment for WADA” and saying that WADA was “being played by the Russians.” The U.S., U.K. and at least 14 other anti-doping agencies have called on WADA to ban Russia.

On the other hand, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach seemed to imply that a 2020 Olympic ban wasn’t likely. “With its suspension from the Olympic Winter Games Pyeongchang 2018, the Russian Olympic Committee has served its sanction, while in other organisations procedures are still ongoing.”