The Russians are fixed. At least for the date. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) announced Tuesday June 2 on its official website that the hearings in the Russian doping case would take place in November 2020.
The panel of judges from the Lausanne-based body will look at the most anticipated, and most publicized, appeal of the year 2020 over four long days, between November 2 and 5. It opposes the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA).
The stakes in the legal battle are not small: they concern Russian sport in its entirety. And could span an entire Olympiad.
As a reminder, last December WADA sanctioned Russian sport, its organizations and its international events, with a 4-year suspension following the discovery of manipulation of data from the Moscow anti-doping laboratory. RUSADA appealed the sanction to the CAS.
The auditions should initially have taken place in April. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed back the date. They were then announced for the month of July. They will now be postponed to next November.
The new procedural schedule is anything but trivial for Russia and, even more so, for its athletes. In the event that the CAS rules in favor of WADA, Russian sport would be removed from the class for 4 years. An eternity, on the scale of a sporting career.
Russia would be banned from participating in major world events, including the Olympics. It could not apply to host international competitions and could lose the benefit of events already allocated.
At this stage, the Court of Arbitration for Sport has not revealed any date for the announcement of its verdict. It may not take place before the start of 2021. Clarification: the sanction will begin upon the outcome of the appeal.
In the event of a “victory” for WADA against RUSADA, Russian athletes would be banned from participating in the Tokyo 2020 and Beijing 2022 Games, but also at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. For the current generation of Russian athletes, the prospect of missing out on two consecutive editions of the Summer Games could spell the end of their Olympic ambitions.
Certainly, the door to the Games would not be entirely closed to them, but they would have to begin a procedure to request eligibility for neutral athlete status. Complex and random.
The postponement of the hearings until next November does not modify the conditions of the appeal. As already announced, the hearing will not be public. WADA had requested this. But it could not be accepted in “ the absence of an agreement between the different parties. »
In Switzerland, the procedure will be conducted by a trio of experts, chaired by Judge Mark L. Williams. The Australian will be assisted by the Franco-Iranian Hamid G. Gharavi and the Italian Luigi Fumagalli.
To add to the complexity of the case, and increase its impact tenfold, the CAS accepted, under the “ intervening parties”, to involve the IOC and the IPC, the Russian Olympic and Paralympic committees, the International Ice Hockey Federation, as well as several Russian athletes for the hearings.
One unknown remains: the conditions of the auditions. They should take place in person, with a physical presence of the speakers. But it cannot be ruled out that the health crisis and travel restrictions will force the CAS to keep them at a distance, by videoconference.
