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Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren has expressed frustration on the received response on his report that laid bare state-sponsored doping across Russian sport.
McLaren hit out at the response of the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Olympic Committee to his explosive findings that accused the sports ministry in Moscow of taking part in the doping scheme and blew wide open the extent of doping across multiple Olympic sports in Russia. It was also alleged by McLaren that former Deputy Sports Minister Yuri Nagornykh personally labeled doping samples of athletes over the course of inspections.
The Canadian lawyer said he resisted publicly commenting on how the international sport community should be responding to his findings.
Speaking at the sports committee meeting at the German parliament in Berlin, McLaren said he is however becoming increasingly frustrated with what has happened to date and added his hope is that today's meeting is the first step towards increasing collaboration and a common action plan.
The second part of McLaren's report was released in December last year. McLaren said he had been disheartened with the lack of common purpose on behalf of the IOC and WADA and action from the international sports community and went on to comment that he wonders sometimes if there is a will to reform.
In another development, a Moscow Court has heard that the sports ministry of Russia is an "affected party" in the investigation into Grigory Rodchenkov and can sue the former head of the Moscow Laboratory. An investigator said in the courtroom that the Sports Ministry that was accused of involvement in an institutionalized conspiracy to cheat to win medals at major events suffered considerable damage as a result of the actions of Rodchenkov. The case files also say the Russian Sports Ministry was subjected to a loss of business reputation.
A sizeable portion of land belonging to Rodchenkov has been seized as part of the investigation, as has a home belonging to his daughter Marina Balakina. The investigators believe the land was bought with money made from the sale of prohibited substances. However, the defense claims there is a lack of evidence and the seizure should therefore be revoked.
Proceedings against Rodchenkov have been initiated by federal investigators in the scandal-hit nation. Rodchenkov turned whistleblower to make sensational claims of systemic illegal drug use by home athletes during the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics and Paralympics. Rodchenkov also claimed that a covert system was used with permission of the government and ministers to replace the urine of affected medal winners with clean samples; it was also claimed that soda containers and baby bottles were used to help athletes avoid testing positive.
Rodchenkov's claims have been categorically denied by the Sports Ministry of Russia. The Ministry rather claims that it was Rodchenkov who persuaded athletes to take unknown substances in Russia. In Russia, Rodchenkov is considered a slanderous traitor guilty of crimes including "perjury, illegal trafficking, fraud, and blackmail". The Moscow anti-doping laboratory's former director is now the subject of allegations from the deputy chairman of the Russian Investigative Committee.