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Russian Skating Union vow to prove athletes innocent of doping

Xinhua, March 10, 2016 Adjust font size:

Russian Skating Union (RSU) intended to prove the innocence of its athletes charged with deliberate violation of anti-doping rules.

"Currently we have a situation in which the leaders of our national teams have been charged with taking a drug they surely did not use deliberately," said head of the RSU Aleksey Kravtsov.

"Our task is to make the ISU (International Skating Union) certain they did not do that on purpose and to persuade it to excuse our athletes. As for what motivated the people who did it, jealousy or money, is a secondary question," Tass news agency quoted Kravtsov as saying.

Recently several Russian skaters have been found using meldonium, a drug used to treat diabetes and low magnesium, also known as mildronate, which was prohibited by World Anti-Doping Agency on Jan. 1 of this year.

Kravtsov said that the RSU would apply to the ISU that meldonium was deliberately included for usage of certain athletes to discredit them.

"We must identify these criminals. We have certain information about this issue, but we cannot disclose it yet," Kravtsov said.

He added that the RSU intended to check those athletes' teammates, warning that "guilty persons will be suspended from sport for life".

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov earlier on Wednesday said Russia will thoroughly investigate doping cases of Russian athletes.

Peskov meanwhile warned that "unacceptable and inexcusable" attempts to politicize sports would destruct international sports. Endit