MOSCOW, January 29. /TASS/. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has disqualified Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva for four years for violating anti-doping rules.

"Ms. Valieva is found to have committed an Anti-Doping Rule Violation (ADRV) under Clause 4.1 of the All-Russian Anti-Doping Rules of June 24, 2021 (the Russian ADR). A period of four years ineligibility is imposed on Ms. Valieva, starting on December 25, 2021. All competitive results of Ms. Valieva from December 25, 2021 are disqualified, with all the resulting consequences," the CAS press service said in a statement.

The CAS panel's decision is final and binding, except for the right of the parties to appeal to the Swiss Federal Court within 30 days on limited grounds. Valieva's side will be able to appeal in case of procedural violations by CAS.

The court emphasized that, having carefully considered all the available evidence, the inquiry concluded that Valieva could not prove her innocence of intentional doping.

The banned drug trimetazidine was found in a sample dated December 25, 2021. The result was made public only in February 2022 during the Olympic Games in Beijing. At that time, the figure skater had already won the team Olympic tournament as a member of the Russian national team. The athlete was admitted to the individual competition, in which she placed fourth.

Valieva took first place in the team event along with Mark Kondratyuk, Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Galliamov, Viktoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov. The US team was second place, Japan third and Canadians fourth. The Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that the distribution of medals in the team event at the Beijing Games should be decided by the respective organizations.

Valieva became the European champion in 2022. Anna Shcherbakova was second and Alexandra Trusova third. The European title will now go to Shcherbakova, the silver medal to Trusova and the bronze to Loena Hendrickx of Belgium, who finished fourth at the tournament.