Russian team in peril after attack on drug agency

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA » The World Anti-Doping Agency placed Russia’s fate for the upcoming Winter Olympics on perilous ground, refusing to reinstate the country’s suspended antidoping operation while Russia remained insistent the government is not to blame.

At its meeting Thursday in South Korea, WADA handed Russia the equivalent of a failing grade, saying two key requirements for reinstating the Russian Anti-Doping Agency had not been fulfilled:

• Russia must publicly accept results of an investigation by Canada’s Richard McLaren that concluded the country ran a state-sponsored doping program.

• Russia must allow access to urine samples collected during the time of the cheating.

“We can’t walk away from the commitments,” said Craig Reedie, the chairman of WADA and a member of the International Olympic Committee, which will ultimately decide Russia’s fate.

Reedie refused to be drawn in on what impact Thursday’s decision might have on the IOC.

“We do not have the right to decide who takes part in international competition,” he said. “I am quite certain that the IOC would prefer that RUSADA was compliant.”

The IOC said its executive board, due to meet Dec. 5-7, “will take all the circumstances, including all the measures to ensure a level playing field at the Olympic Winter Games 2018, into consideration when it decides on the participation of the Russian athletes.”

Among those circumstances will be Russia’s continued denial that a state-sponsored program existed.

Leaders in the country have depicted the doping program that marred the 2014 Games in Sochi as the work of individuals, not the government. Alexander Zhukov, the president of the Russian Olympic Committee and a member of the IOC, doubled down on that Thursday, telling WADA members that “We absolutely deny the existence of a state-sponsored doping system.”

“It is clear that an unconditional recognition of the McLaren Report is impossible,” Zhukov said. “Such a requirement cannot, and should not serve as an obstacle to the full compliance of RUSADA.”

The Kremlin also repeated the denial of any government backing for dopers.

“WADA’s decision was unpleasant news. We disagree with this decision and consider it unfair,” said Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Meanwhile, the honorary president of the Russian Olympic Committee, Leonid Tyagachev, told Govorit Moskva radio that the key whistleblower on the Sochi scandal, former Moscow lab director Grigory Rodchenkov “simply needs to be shot for his untruths.”