President Putin calls for the establishment of an independent commission to investigate doping

(Baonghean.vn) - Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 22 called for the establishment of an independent commission, including foreign experts, to identify remaining problems in the country's anti-doping system.

President Vladimir Putin is particularly concerned about the issue of anti-doping. Photo: Reuters

According to Mr. Putin, the main task of this committee is to “seriously control the effective implementation of national plans on anti-doping”.

Mr. Putin proposed Mr. Vitaly Smirnov - a sports official and former vice president of the IOC - to be the head of this independent commission.

Mr. Smirnov has also agreed to take on the responsibilities of the Russian Olympic Committee's Anti-Doping Commission.

Mr. Putin said: “I think it is reasonable to assign the Russian Olympic Committee to establish this independent committee, I want to emphasize the word “independent”. Accordingly, in addition to Russian experts, there will also be foreign experts as well as public figures in the fields of medicine and sports.”

“There will never be a place for doping in sports,” Mr. Putin said, while requiring the Russian Olympic Committee to closely coordinate with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA).

Following a large-scale doping scandal, many Russian athletes have been banned from competing by the World Athletics Federation, and it is likely that Russian athletics will not be able to participate in the Olympics in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil this coming August.

There have also been calls for the entire Russian team to be banned from competing at this summer's Olympics after a WADA report said the Russian Sports Ministry and the Federal Security Service (FSB) covered up doping by Russian athletes at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.

Diep Khanh

(According to RT)