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Russian Olympic chief: WADA criticized for publishing McLaren’s report before Olympics

DOHA (Qatar), November 16. /TASS/. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) was criticized at the General Assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) in Doha over its report on doping in Russia published before the Rio Olympics, Russia’s Olympic Chief Alexander Zhukov said on Wednesday.

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The WADA Independent Commission led by Richard McLaren published the first part of its report on alleged doping in Russia on July 18. The Rio Olympic Games in Brazil began on August 5.

"During the ANOC assembly, very serious criticism was voiced against WADA over the time limits of publishing the first part of the McLaren report," the head of the Russian Olympic Committee said.

"Several people directly asked WADA Head Craig Reedie: why did you decide directly on the eve of the Olympiad to publish some report, which does not contain any direct evidence of breaches? Reedie tried to answer this question but, to my mind, this sounded completely unconvincingly," Zhukov said.

ANOC President Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Sabah earlier expressed his concern that the second part of the McLaren repot on doping in Russia might be published during a session of the Executive Board of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on December 6 that will pass a decision on Russia.

In the opinion of the ANOC’s head, the publication of the report within these time limits may be destructive.

In Zhukov’s opinion, WADA chooses the time of publication intentionally - to coincide with certain dates.

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Russian sports minister says couple pages missing from McLaren's initial report

"Now WADA has been subjected to very strong criticism for its decision to deprive the anti-doping laboratory in Doha of accreditation on the eve of the ANOC assembly in Qatar," the Russian Olympic chief said.

"No one understood why this had been done precisely now. That is why, everyone grows suspicious that these reports are intentionally published to coincide with specific dates or events," Zhukov said.

"This is not right and IOC President Thomas Bach has already said that Russia should necessarily have a possibility to react to the content of the second part of the McLaren report before any decisions are made," the Russian Olympic chief said.

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