The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Cas judgment on Russia's athletes: what was left of the sentence

2020-12-17T19:22:35.954Z


Two instead of four years ban for major events like the Olympic Games - and otherwise Russia got away with the ruling of the World Sports Court: There are plenty of loopholes.


Icon: enlarge

Russian flag in front of the Olympic rings: The nation will not be part of the next games - at least not in all honors

Photo: Matt Slocum / AP

A chamber of the World Sports Court of Justice halved Russia's partial ban on Thursday to two years.

The world anti-doping agency Wada had partially excluded Russia from major events for a period of four years in December 2019.

The formulations left all sorts of loopholes at the time.

This is no different with the arbitration ruling of the three-member chamber of the CAS - at all levels the CAS judges Mark Williams (Australia), Luigi Fumagalli (Italy) and Hamid Gharavi (France / Iran) have softened the sanctions, in many ways canceled or up reduced beyond recognition.

Whether the 186-page judgment will be published in full remains unclear, it will now be discussed with the parties involved, the Cas only announced.

Russia and its sports organizations can go to the Swiss Federal Supreme Court.

The Cas, led by IOC Vice President John Coates (Australia), has so far only published a five-page message in the Russia case.

The CAS is by no means an independent body, because the Sports Court is dominated and financed by the IOC.

President Coates is IOC President Thomas Bach's most important confidante.

CAS judgments often enough reflect the interests of the IOC.

The scandal-proven professional functionary Coates heads the IOC commission that deals with the 2021 Summer Olympics in Tokyo.

At the same time, Coates is applying with Queensland for the 2032 Summer Games. Such conflicts of interest shape the Olympic world, and knowing them is important to understand the context.

The remaining sanctions against Russia come into effect immediately and apply until December 16, 2022. If the Federal Supreme Court does not overturn the decision, which can only happen in the case of gross procedural errors, the Russian anti-doping agency Rusada will remain suspended in accordance with the Wada decision .

Russia will take part in the 2021 Summer Games in Tokyo and the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing, just not in full honor.

The participation of Russian athletes who submit to a doping control regime and may be considered unencumbered will, as in 2016 and 2018, be approved by Wada, IOC and the respective sports associations.

The country name can be on the jerseys

As in Rio de Janeiro and PyeongChang, one can expect hundreds of Russians, this time under the label of "neutral athletes".

Russian flags and anthems should not officially be allowed in the arenas of Tokyo and Beijing.

In a sense, this only applies to the playing fields, not to spectators in the stands.

After the 2018 Olympic ice hockey victory in PyeongChang, the Russians also threw the national anthem on the ice.

The Russians can ignore many of the points that remain from the originally imposed sanctions.

A year ago it was still said that the name »Russia« should not appear on jerseys, the Cas lawyers have made this generous offer: »Russia« can be written on sportswear - only the words "neutral athletes" should appear »just as prominently«.

Important events will remain in Russia

It will be seen whether anything remains of this apparently tough part of the Cas judgment: Until December 2022, Russia will not be allowed to compete for the Olympic Games or World Championships in the more than 100 sports associations that have signed the Wada Code.

World championships that have already been awarded to Russia are to be withdrawn.

Since the sanction period has been halved from four to two years, Russia will be allowed to host the Ice Hockey World Championship in Vladimir Putin's hometown of St. Petersburg in 2023.

Only as a replacement for the 2021 World Cup and the World Cup host Belarus, which is highly controversial due to ongoing human rights violations, Russia is likely to fail.

The Russians can easily get over that.

The SportAccord congress is planned for May 2021 in Yekaterinburg.

It is the world's largest meeting of officials every year.

More than 100 world associations, Olympic and non-Olympic, meet together with many dozen IOC members and all kinds of other umbrella organizations and organizations.

SportAccord was demonstratively awarded in the context of the Wada decision a year ago.

What we know so far from the Cas judgment suggests that the major congress with almost 2,000 delegates may take place in Yekaterinburg - should the pandemic fight such an event.

Russia, supposedly sanctioned in world sport, promises the largest and most magnificent congress of all time.

The Universiade, the World Student Games, in Yekaterinburg in the summer of 2023 is now also secured.

Welcome to the invitation

The games of the European Football Championship 2021 in St. Petersburg are not affected either.

A year ago, the Wada had created confusion in its verdict with rather unusual terms such as "Major Event" and "International Event." It would have been easy to create clarity with better formulations. Uefa derived a license for the games from them In St. Petersburg. The Chamber of the Cas only speaks of world championships. With continental title fights, world cups and other events different rules apply. Since the sport with its highest sports court is extremely flexible, so as not to make it so painful for the Russians However, Formula 1 can also count as the world championship. And Russia, with Putin's residence city Sochi, is also in the program for 2021. The automobile umbrella organization Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile has signed the Wada code. It will be interesting to see if not still a way out for Sochi is found.

The ban on senior Russian sports officials and government officials has basically been overturned completely.

In their "personal roles" as representatives in the International Olympic Committee, in the Paralympic Committee, such persons can take part in the Olympic Games and World Championships.

At the invitation of the heads of state or government of the respective hosts, nothing stands in the way of high-ranking Russians taking part.

The Sports Court devotes a considerable part of its previously published elaborate to such diplomatic subtleties.

In other words: the politicians responsible for the Russian state doping are given carte blanche.

Icon: The mirror

Source: spiegel

All sports articles on 2020-12-17

You may like

Trends 24h

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.