17 August 2020

RusAF Restoration Commission meeting postponed

The Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) postponed a scheduled meeting of its Restoration Commission from 14 August to 18 August, it announced on Friday. In announcing that RusAF would remain suspended until 30 September, one of World Athletics’ criticisms was that a ‘reinstatement commission’ formed under RusAF President Evgeny Yurchenko (Евгений Юрченко) had failed to hold a single meeting. Yurchenko announced his resignation on 13 July, but on 10 August announced that he would remain as RusAF President until 30 November. 

The RusAF Working Group putting together RusAF’s reinstatement plan, which must be provided to World Athletics by 31 August, is controversial. It contains representatives of RusAF, the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC), the Ministry of Sports and the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA). Along with the RPC, the ROC is one of two Founders of RUSADA and will hold a meeting on 28 August on whether to accept the RUSADA Supervisory Board’s recommendation to dismiss Yuriy Ganus (Ю́рий Га́нус), RUSADA’s Director General. Ganus has alleged that one of the reasons the ROC and RPC are keen to remove him from his post is that he refused their request, made at a 29 April meeting, to give athletes five minutes advance notice about doping tests.

Last month, World Athletics announced that RusAF would remain suspended until 30 September, after it failed to pay half of a US$10 million fine and related costs ($6.3 million) by 1 July. The fine related to a March sanction imposed for falsifying information to assist high jumper Danil Lysenko in a ‘whereabouts’ case. Last week, RusAF announced that a ‘one-off subsidy’ from Russia’s Ministry of Sports had enabled it to pay the fine.

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