Inside the Games
Richard Pound has criticised International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach for the way he is continuing to respond to doping problems involving Russia and has expressed concerns over the aims of investigations currently underway.
The Canadian does believe, though, that the IOC will find enough evidence to prosecute individual Russian athletes implicated in doping at the 2014 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games in Sochi.
Two IOC investigations are currently underway following the McLaren Report’s evidence of institutional doping implicating more than 1,000 Russian athletes, at events including Sochi 2014.
Bach revealed last week he hopes the IOC will be able to take actions regarding Russia by the start of the winter sporting season in October.
The German also dismissed those who have criticised the way he has dealt with the situation on the grounds they are part of a “momentary political upheaval” and are attempting to “personally discredit” him.
“He [Bach] clearly feels under some sort of pressure,” Pound, the most senior IOC member and founding World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) President, told insidethegames today.
“This approach is pretty much the attitude he has had all along.
“He could have had his collective responsibility-individual justice mantra resolved by letting Russian athletes who could prove they were clean compete in Rio [2016], but behind the Olympic flag, not the Russian flag.
“But he took the wrong fork in the road, and refused to do this.
“It is not a consistent standard which is being applied now.
“Not all Kuwait athletes banned from competing in Rio under their own flag were supporters of the regime, and not all South African athletes were supporters of Apartheid, but the greater good called for South Africa to be expelled.”
