Vladimir Putin Admits Issues With Russian Doping System

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has agreed that his country should follow the proposals set forth by the McLaren Report and restructure its anti-doping system, according to a report from USA TODAY Sports (via Russian news agency TASS).

“The most important thing is that we heed the demands of the independent [McLaren] commission despite its drawbacks, because we need to admit that some cases of doping have really been detected, as doping is completely unacceptable. This means that the current Russian anti-doping system has failed, and this is our fault,” Putin said.

Putin, however, continues to insist that there was no “institutional conspiracy to conceal positive doping tests in Russia and there never will be.”

The World Anti-Doping Agency put out a statement commending Putin’s reaction as positive.

“WADA is encouraged by this sign of progress from the highest political levels in Russia today,” WADA president Craig Reedie said in a statement. “Since November 2015, the Agency, UK Anti-Doping and others have been working hard in supporting Russia’s efforts to rebuild a credible anti-doping system. This public admission by Russian President Vladimir Putin that their ‘anti-doping system has failed’ is an important step in the right direction.”

Since the release of the two parts of the McLaren Independent Person Report, in July and in December, provided evidence of a Russian state-sponsored doping program, the top officials in the Russian government had been mostly silent aside from Anna Antseliovich, the acting director general of Russia’s national anti-doping agency, who commented that the doping program had been an “institutional conspiracy” but did not involve the highest levels of the government.

Russia was banned from the Paralympic Games as a sanction for this program and continues to be suspended by both the IPC and the IAAF, the international track and field federation.

Read more from USA TODAY here. Read the full statement from WADA here.

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