President of the ROC commented on the current official statement of the Russian Investigative Committee.
Alexander Zhukov:
“The information released today by the Russian Investigative Committee in the framework of a criminal investigation into Mr. Rodchenkov is very important and should be taken into account by the international sports organizations, anti-doping agencies and the IOC commissions.
A great job has been done. The investigators have questioned more than 700 athletes, coaches, medical workers and other officials, conducted a comprehensive study, and collected convincing evidence base.
The investigators questioned more than 700 athletes, coaches, medical workers of the Russian national teams living throughout the Russian Federation, employees of the All-Russian Sports Federations, the Center for Sports Training of the Russian National Teams, RUSADA and the Anti-Doping Center. But none of them confirmed the existence of a certain doping program. If there were any violations of the anti-doping rules, they were of a purely individual nature,” the statement read.
The investigative Committee has denied allegations of substitution of positive doping samples of Russian athletes for negative ones, at the Olympic Games in the anti-doping laboratory in Sochi, as well as the existence in Russia of some state doping program. Experts believe that violations of the anti-doping rules were purely individual.
The evidence provided by Professor McLaren regarding thousands of Russian athletes involved in doping, as well as a number of other conclusions contained in his report document were not confirmed.
Here I would mention the investigations, conducted by the international sports federations in regard with information provided in the report. The investigation revealed that vast majority of Russian athletes were clean.
Pay attention to the information about current activities of Gregory Rodchenkov. His attempts of bribery and obstruction of impartial investigation undermine the credibility of his testimony.
The Russian Olympic Committee, for its part, plans to bring the information provided by the Investigative Committee to the attention of Oswald and Schmid commissions, as well as of the WADA governing bodies. Hopefully it will be taken into account when considering issues be under their jurisdiction.
Very glad that our boxer Alexander Povetkin has been cleared, and found not guilty of doping. He was cleared of all charges and his lifetime ban for doping was lifted.
I hope that by the end of proceedings of the Denis Oswald’s Commission, fair, objective decisions will be made regarding our athletes as well.”
