Kenya to submit doping report, Russia still banned- IAAF

Kenya will be required to submit a report on its anti-doping programme to world athletics governing body, the IAAF in three months but the Russian senior track and field team remains banned from international competition.

Kenya is one of the five countries placed under critical care concerning their national anti-doping programme in March last year by the IAAF Council and the status was extended to 2017.

Neighbours and arch rivals Ethiopia, Morocco, Belarus and Ukraine are the other nations on the IAAF watch list.

“The IAAF implemented an action plan to monitor compliance to IAAF Rule 30.6 with respect to the federations of Ethiopia, Morocco, Belarus, Kenya and Ukraine.

“Today (Monday) the Council received presentations from Morocco and Ukraine on the progress they have made in 2016.

“Individual action plans are being prepared for the next six months in the lead up to the IAAF World Championships London 2017. Belarus, Ethiopia and Kenya will report again in three months and Ukraine will report on a monthly basis over that period,” a statement from the IAAF read.

Last month, Athletics Kenya (AK) in partnership with the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya (ADAK) announced a programme where the country’s athletes would be required to be cleared by a team of six medics from the Kenya Doctors Network before being cleared to compete internationally.

And last week, ADAK declared an extension of their partnership with their Norwegian counterparts saying doping cases involving suspended senior AK officials and athletes were in various stages of conclusion.

-Russia blow-

At the same time, Rune Andersen, the independent chairman of the IAAF Taskforce, delivered its latest report on the reinstatement of the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF).

The Taskforce’s recommendation, which Council approved, was that RusAF was not ready for reinstatement.

“While acknowledging several positive developments at its recent meetings in Moscow last month with RusAF President Dimitri Shlyakhtin, Colonel Zherdev of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, 1500m runner Andrey Dmitriev and new Minister for Sport Pavel Kolobkov, the Taskforce pointed to some negative developments since its last report to Council in December.

“These have included unhelpful public comments recently made by some Russian sporting officials. RusAF also continues to face practical and legal difficulties in enforcing provisional doping bans and there continues to be very limited testing of Russian track and field athletes at the national level as well as troubling incidents at what testing is taking place,” the statement from IAAF added.

The Task Force set a roadmap for Russia to be re-admitted back to the international fold including all outstanding Verification Criteria must be satisfied.

The testing of Russian athletes must take place without further incidents or difficulties and RusAF explains why in the past it has been unable to and how in the future it will be able to enforce all suspensions imposed on athletes and athlete support personnel under its jurisdiction in an effective and timely fashion;

“There has been an appropriate official response by Russia to the McLaren findings that officials from the Ministry for Sport, the FSB, and the Centre for Sport Preparation were involved in the doping scheme, either by convincingly rebutting the findings or acknowledging and properly addressing them,” the report went on.

“It is the IAAF’s natural instinct to assist the competition opportunities of clean athletes. Since Russia’s suspension in November 2015, the IAAF has established a clear pathway for athletes who are not tainted by the Russian system to apply to compete internationally as neutral athletes while their federation remains suspended,” the IAAF clarified.

“On 17 June 2016, Council amended Competition Rule 22.1 to allow athletes to apply for permission to compete, with guidelines for those applications published on 23 June 2016 and updated on 3 January 2017.

“To facilitate this process, 30 Russian athletes were added to the IAAF International Registered Testing Pool (IRTP) in 2016. In addition, 10 athletes were added in January 2017, bringing the total of Russian athletes in the pool to more than 60,” the report on Russia outlined.