Russia shuts Moscow laboratory after doping report – Russian anti-doping chief

Published 11/10/2015, 8:32 AM EST

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via Reuters

MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Moscow laboratory used for doping tests has stopped operating after its accreditation was suspended by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the head of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency, Nikita Kamaev, said on Tuesday.

Kamaev, responding to allegations of widespread doping among Russian athletes, urged commentators to distinguish between the laboratory and Russia’s anti-doping agency, which he said was acting “in full compliance with the demands of the WADA codex”.

His comments are the latest in a string of defensive remarks by Russian officials, following a hard-hitting report commissioned by WADA which alleged widespread doping by Russian athletes and official collusion in a cover-up.

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Earlier, the Kremlin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, described the allegations as “quite groundless”.

Kamaev said there were question marks about the credibility of the sources used in the report because they included sports people who had themselves failed doping tests.

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“When the words of a sportsman who has broken the rules several times, and has already been disqualified, carry more weight than ours, then questions arise,” he said.

He also said that Russia was on the path to cleaning up sport, emphasising the broadly efficient activity of the agency he heads.

“There are problems, but … the objective facts, based on statistics, show that the Russian Anti-Doping Agency … is quite effective,” he said.

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“The agency takes the highest number of sanctions against transgressors in the world.”

(Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin and Christian Lowe; Writing by Jason Bush; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

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