World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) President Sir Craig Reedie has refused to rule out the prospect of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) remaining non-compliant until the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.
Deadlock is continuing over Russia’s failure to comply with two specific re-compliance criteria.
The first concerns the country’s failure to publicly accept the findings of the WADA-commissioned McLaren Report and the second involves the granting of access of sample information in the Moscow Laboratory.
There is no indication that Russia is likely to back down.
Sir Craig “hopes” that the situation will be resolved soon but offered no sign that they would be prepared to band-down and change their stance.
“I hope not, clearly [that the ban will remain in place until Tokyo 2020],” he said here today.
“We have to cross this bridge at some stage and we will continue to adhere to the roadmap which we agreed with Russian officials, which includes the two conditions.
“My wish is that, when the dust settled after this whole exercise here in Pyeongchang that, maybe, within the next few months wiser counsel will apply in Russia and we can actually do that.
“In the meantime, we will continue to support the RUSADA and the improvement they have made under their new director general [Yury Ganus] to make sure there is proper testing done in that huge country.”
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