Russia scoffs at dope cover-up claims
RUSSIAN Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said allegations he had helped cover up a top footballer’s positive doping test were silly and that he and Russia were being smeared as payback for winning the right to host the 2018 World Cup.
Mutko, who is battling to end a doping scandal that has placed a question mark over Russian athletes’ right to compete at the 2016 Rio Olympics, was responding to allegations against him made by Germany’s ARD/WDR.
The German broadcaster, whose reports led to the suspension of Russia’s track-and-field athletes, said an alleged internal sports ministry e-mail exchange discussing a footballer’s failed test said the matter should be forwarded to ‘VL’.
That, it said, referred to Vitaly Leontiyevich Mutko.
“Initials could be interpreted in a different way,” Mutko was quoted as saying yesterday by TASS new agency. “How could I help to hide this? Destroy it myself? This is silly stuff, unconvincing.”
After being suspended by the International Association of Athletics Federations last year, Russia is trying to convince sports authorities it is serious about rooting out cheats in time for the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in August.
The IAAF will decide whether Russia has done enough to have the ban overturned at a meeting in Vienna next Friday.
Backing its sports minister, the Kremlin said the allegations made by ARD/WDR were “unfounded slander” and based on testimonials by fugitives such as former Russian anti-doping chief Grigory Rodchenkov.
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