Situation around the decision by the International Olympic Committee to suspend the Russian Olympic Committee

Excerpts from Dmitry Medvedev’s opening remarks at a Government meeting.

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Dmitry Medvedev: As you know, the International Olympic Committee took the decision to suspend the Russian Olympic Committee and made it impossible for our athletes to compete under the Russian flag. In this context, I would like to say a few words, taking into consideration the position articulated yesterday by the President of Russia, as well as the Government’s perspective, since all this also affects our work.

First of all, the decision clearly has a fact-based and a political side. It is obvious that there was a doping issue in Russian sport, and we openly recognised this. We launched proactive efforts to address it. An Independent Public Anti-Doping Commission was established, as you may recall. A special plan, called the National Plan to Fight Doping in Russian Sport, was adopted alongside a package of measures to implement this plan. This goes to say that we started serious work. I’m not even talking about amendments to administrative offences legislation and the Criminal Code. We developed informational and educational programmes to prevent anti-doping rule violations by athletes and team staff.

This line of action or policy continues to this day, so we have not given up on any of these initiatives. On the contrary, we have been keeping up this momentum no matter the context of any decisions, and will continue moving in this direction in the future.

More to be posted soon…