WADA review calls on IAAF to ban Russia from athletics

The World Anti-Doping Agency has recommended that the IAAF suspend Russia from competition until improved measures are taken. The review by Dick Pound, the former WADA president who has spent 11 months looking into claims of systemic cheating and cover-up within Russian athletics and the sport’s governing body, has also recommended that five athletes and five coaches be given lifetime bans for the use of banned substances. The review also accuses the Russian government of 'direct intimidation' over their Moscow doping lab, which WADA say should lose its accreditation. The results of the report were released at the same time that the International Olympic Committee said that the former president of the IAAF Lamine Diack should be provisionally suspended as an honorary member. The 82-year old from Senegal is accused of being complicit in a cover-up of illegal substance abuse Russian athletes. French police confirmed that he is under investigation for allegedly receiving more than 1 million euros to cover up the use of performance enhancing substances.