Moscow’s Basmanny Court has accepted the Russian athletics federation’s (ARAF) defamation claim against German broadcaster ARD, in relation to two documentaries produced by journalist Hajo Seppelt about doping in Russia. “The court ruled in favour of the suit presented by ARAF”, a court representative told Russian news agency Ria Novosti.

ARAF had appealed to the Moscow court after a Kirov district court threw out ARAF’s claim and a claim from Valentin Balakhnichev, who resigned as ARAF President and stood down as Treasurer of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) earlier this year. It is understood that ARAF claims that its ‘honour and dignity’ has been damaged by the ARD documentaries, the first of which aired just over a year ago and took the title ‘Top secret doping: how Russia makes its winners’. The second documentary, ‘Top secret doping: the shadowy world of athletics’ aired in August this year, and made further allegations about Russian doping.

The IAAF suspended ARAF on 13 November, after an investigation by an independent commission appointed by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) found that ARAF had conspired to hide Russian doping. WADA has since suspended the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA), which issued an August statement arguing that the information in the documentary ‘either isn’t true, or speaks about incompetence of authors of this film’.