VIDEO & ARTICLE: “The Masters Of Nothing”
(RFE/RL – rferl.org – The Daily Vertical: Brian Whitmore – March 11, 2016) Is it real or is it parody? Chechnya’s human rights ombudsman said a group of journalists and human rights activists brutally...
View ArticleWho’s to blame for the meldonium: Russia’s athletes, doctors or officials?
The drug that has been banned since January 2016 may lead to the disqualification of several leading Russian athletes in the wake of the Maria Sharapova scandal. However, Russian officials and...
View ArticleInterfax: Putin requests not to promote ‘conspiracy theory’ regarding doping...
(Interfax – March 16, 2016) Russian President Vladimir Putin has called on the chiefs of the Russian sports to refrain from politicizing the situation related to the meldonium use and from framing a...
View ArticleWADA banned meldonium without studying period of its withdrawal from...
MOSCOW. March 22 (Interfax) – Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko has said that the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) did not publish the results of research on meldonium before banning this substance....
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Revelations of State-Backed Doping Should Bar Russia From Rio...
Accusations of Russian doping and reported claims of systematic distribution of performance-enhancing drugs and of bribes paid to cover up positive tests would be enough to scare off officials of any...
View ArticleRBTH: Olympic doping scandal: Whistleblower Rodchenkov may face court in Russia
Grigory Rodchenkov’s exposure of Russian Olympic champions’ use of doping contains many unsubstantiated accusations and few facts, say Russian officials and experts. (Russia Beyond the Headlines –...
View ArticleInterfax: Mutko believes in rebirth of Russian track and field athletics
MOSCOW. May 20 (Interfax) – After the restoration of its rights, Russian track and field athletics should start with “a clean slate,” Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko told Interfax. “The majority...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Russia’s reported doping is a subversion of the Olympic ideal”–...
… The latest evidence is a detailed report in the New York Times that Russian officials clandestinely carried out a doping program at the Sochi Games by giving athletes performance-enhancing drugs and...
View ArticleInterfax: Russia won’t put up with unsubstantiated slander against it on...
MOSCOW. June 8 (Interfax) – Russia is against the use of doping in sports, but that does not mean that it is ready to put up with unsubstantiated slander against it on this issue, Russian presidential...
View ArticleAnti-doping rule breakers will be harshly punished – Mutko
MOSCOW. June 9 (Interfax) – The harshest measures will be taken against those who were caught violating anti-doping rules, Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko said. “If this is established, naturally,...
View ArticleBanned Russian Runners Struggle to Keep Their Careers Afloat
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Daria Litvinova – June 11, 2016) His first international race, the Kanazawa marathon was a special occasion for Viktor Ugarov, 30. Thousands of amateur Japanese...
View ArticleInterfax: Putin promises fight against doping at state level
ST. PETERSBURG. June 17 (Interfax) – Russia will fight against doping in sports at the state level, Russian President Vladimir Putin said. “As for the official Russian authorities, I can say with full...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Olympic Ban Adds to Russia’s Culture of Grievances”– New York Times
When a global governing body for sports barred Russia’s track and field team from the 2016 Summer Olympics on Friday over a wide-ranging doping scandal, it was greeted in Russia, as is so often the...
View ArticleAll Russians Are Tainted by Putin’s Regime
(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Leonid Bershidsky – June 21, 2016) The International Olympic Committee’s decision to let Russian athletes compete in the Rio Olympics if they can prove that they haven’t...
View ArticleSharapova to spend disqualification period at Harvard
Maria Sharapova enrolls at Harvard Business School after being banned from tennis for two years. (Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – NIKOLAI LITOVKIN, RBTH – June 27, 2016) Russian tennis player...
View ArticleKremlin: Russia Will Not Boycott Rio Olympics
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – July 11, 2016) Russia will not boycott the upcoming Olympic Games in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday, Russian media reported....
View ArticleTRANSCRIPT: [Putin] Statement in response to the report by the World...
(Kremlin.ru – July 18, 2016) President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Recent events and the tense atmosphere that has formed around international sport and the Olympic movement involuntarily recall the...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Bar Russia from the Rio Olympics”– Washington Post
At the Winter Olympics in Sochi … no Russian athletes tested positive for doping, and to much celebration they took home 33 medals, more than any other nation. … behind the scenes, a system was in...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Why Russia’s Olympic scandals could benefit Vladimir Putin”– Yahoo
If you think the Russian doping scandal has brought shame and humiliation to Vladimir Putin’s nation, perhaps you need to think again. Experts on Putin and Russia tell Yahoo Sports it may be the...
View ArticleA Long Jump: Russia Claims Moral Victory From Rio Olympics
(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Tom Balmforth – MOSCOW, August 22, 2016) Russia’s medal haul at the Summer Olympics in Rio was the country’s smallest since the 1912 games in Stockholm, but that did not deter...
View ArticleRBTH: Over 1,000 Russian athletes involved in doping scandal – McLaren report
In a more detailed version of the report released in July, the head of the independent WADA commission has announced that the international doping scandal implicates over 1,000 Russian athletes, and...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Russia Hopes for Swift End to Track and Field Doping Exile”– AP
“… Russian track and field exists in limbo, banned since November 2015 as a series of investigations revealed widespread doping and alleged government officials helped to cover it up. … On Monday,...
View ArticleKicking habits, kicking back; In Russia, a punitive Soviet approach to drug...
(opendemocracy.net – Dmitry Lebedev – February 20, 2017) Dmitry Lebedev is a freelance journalist from Moscow. He holds a Master’s research degree in political philosophy from Radboud University,...
View ArticleInterfax: Tragic events associated with informers in Russia, this institution...
KRASNODAR. May 23 (Interfax) – Russian President Vladimir Putin has called for treating the idea of introducing an institution of informers into Russian sports with extreme caution, recalling that...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Russian answer to opioid epidemic: ‘Cold turkey’; Russia has an...
“Russia has an opioid addiction crisis about as grave as America’s. … the two countries’ approaches to the problem could hardly be more different. … most US and European clinics offer patients...
View ArticleWhat do Regular Russians Think of the IOC’s Olympic Doping Ban?
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – December 6, 2017) “This is undoubtedly a political decision,” says Igor, 40. In Moscow, news that Russia’s entire Olympic team had been barred from next year’s...
View ArticleRussia’s Channel One Will Broadcast Olympics, Despite Team’s Ban
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – December 12, 2017) Russia’s state-run Channel One television channel has announced that it will broadcast the 2018 Winter Game’s despite the International Olympic...
View ArticleInterfax: Putin warns against further politicization of global sports
NOVO-OGARYOVO. Jan 31 (Interfax) – Russia hopes that international sports organizations will not turn into government departments in certain countries however powerful these might seem sometimes,...
View ArticleRussian Olympians’ Last Ditch Appeals to Compete in the Winter Games, Explained
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – February 8, 2018) Although Russia has long been a powerhouse in the Winter Olympics, its flag, anthem and tricolor will be absent from the games kicking off...
View ArticleInterfax: Global anti-doping system reform needed, IOC president resignation...
MOSCOW. Feb 9 (Interfax) – There needs to be a reform of the global anti-doping system after the Olympic Games, but Russia has no direct influence on the composition of the leadership of international...
View ArticleNEWSLINK: “Russia, the Olympics’ Awkward Guest”– New York Times/James Hill
“Despite the country being barred from the Winter Games, Russian athletes and fans showed up and had a good time. …”
View ArticleRussian sports minister suggests putting WADA in charge of national...
MOSCOW. April 2 (Interfax) – Russian anti-doping organizations could become branches of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), which in that case would be responsible for their work, Russian Sports...
View ArticleNEWSWATCH: “Russia hosts World Cup in heat of battle with West”– AFP
“… Russia was a controversial choice when it was handed the rights to the world’s most watched event in a 2010 vote now tainted by bribery charges. … The years since have seen Moscow clash with the...
View ArticleRUSSIALINK: “Russian Doping Scandal Whistleblower Expects Clean World Cup”–...
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – June 1, 2018) Russian former anti-doping chief-turned-whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov said on Thursday that one player in hosts Russia’s provisional World Cup...
View ArticleRUSSIALINK: “U.S. Requests Doping Tests of Russian World Cup Team”– Moscow Times
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – June 22, 2018) The United States reportedly requested results from Russian footballers’ doping tests following a sudden improvement in performance during the World...
View ArticleJRL NEWSWATCH: “Can we believe what we see at Putin’s World Cup?”– San Diego...
“… [when] FIFA’s 22-person executive committee awarded both the 2018 and 2022 World Cups … victories by Russia and Qatar … risky bids, were met with immediate speculation of vote bartering and outright...
View ArticleNEWSLINK: “Russia’s performance in World Cup – and the country’s history –...
“Russia will meet Croatia in the quarterfinals Saturday in Sochi, where it will play in a stadium built to stage the opening and closing ceremonies of those now-discredited Winter Olympics. And though...
View ArticleJRL NEWSWATCH: “World Anti-Doping Agency Reinstates Russia”– AP
“[WADA] reinstated Russia on Thursday despite a wave of protests, ending the nearly three-year suspension of the country’s drug-testing program because of a state-sponsored doping scheme. WADA’s...
View ArticleJRL NEWSWATCH: “Putin on Rap Music: It’s the Drugs That Really Bother Him”–...
“Told that rap and hip-hop have grown wildly popular among Russian youth, and that … lyrics are rebellious, mention drugs and include many swear words … Putin mused about banning the music outright …...
View ArticleWADA ‘Bitterly Disappointed’ At Russian Failure To Meet Anti-Doping Deadline
(Article ©2019 RFE/RL, Inc., Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty – rferl.org – Jan. 1, 2019 – also appeared at...
View ArticleWADA to Inspect Moscow Lab for Doping Violations
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – January 8, 2019) With the clock ticking towards new sanctions, Russian authorities said on Monday they would allow a World Anti-Doping Agency inspection team to...
View ArticleHow Russian Media Reacted to 4-Year Olympics Ban
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Dec. 10, 2019) The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) on Monday hit Russia with a four-year ban from competing or hosting major world sporting events, including the...
View ArticleRUSSIALINK: “Why Russia Can’t Compete in the Tokyo Olympics, But Its Athletes...
(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – July 29, 2021) Russian athletes have won a total of 25 medals in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics under the neutral Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) flag. Here’s our guide to...
View ArticleWADA Revokes Approval Of Russian Anti-Doping Laboratory
The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has revoked the right of a Russian laboratory to carry out blood sample analysis after it failed to comply with laboratory standards and ethics [...]
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