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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

A WADA report [wada-ama.org] has found that Russian security services were involved in operating a state-sanctioned doping program during previous Olympic games that threw out positive drug test results. This is referred to as "Disappearing Positive Methodology" in the report. A decision to cheat was apparently made following poor Russian performance and medal count at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics. The cheating was not limited to track and field as previously believed. As a result, the IOC has convened an emergency meeting and likely intends to ban all Russian athletes [bbc.com] from competing in the upcoming Olympic and Paralympic Games:

Russia should be banned from this summer's Olympics and Paralympics after evidence was found of a four-year, state-sponsored doping programme, says the World Anti-Doping Agency. A Wada-commissioned report found urine samples of Russian competitors were manipulated across the "vast majority" of summer and winter Olympic sports from late 2011 to August 2015.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will decide on Tuesday whether to provisionally ban Russia from the Rio Olympics, which start on 5 August. IOC president Thomas Bach will host a telephone conference call to decide on "provisional measures and sanctions".

Some of the data was recovered from wiped hard drives, and microscopic tool marks were also found on the bottles of the swapped urine samples. Crucially, Russian FSB agent Evgeny Blokhin gained access to a Sochi drug testing lab disguised as a sewage and pipes engineer. Russia president Vladimir Putin has said he will suspend some of the officials named in the report, but warned against "politics" interfering with sports [kremlin.ru].

Also at the New York Times [nytimes.com], The Guardian [theguardian.com], NPR [npr.org], and RT [rt.com].

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