Sputnik: How politicized is WADA's push for recognition of the McLaren report by RUSADA, considering there is no solid evidence of any state-sponsored scheme?
Andy Brown: Well, I think that what we've reached here is political stalemate, really. WADA requires, as part of its Roadmap to Compliance, it requires the Russian authorities to recognize the conclusions of the McLaren report and also to provide access to the lab and the database that contains testing from the lab and tests done on athletes. Now, that is currently under the protection of the Russian Investigative Committee […] which is also investigating the allegations of state collusion and doping. The question that has to be asked is: "Are the athletes who are hoping to compete in the Winter Olympics, are they implicated by any of this?" And the answer has to be: "The vast majority of them — no." And it's the athletes are yet again suffering from political maneuvering on both sides and this is where, I think, the Russian public needs to sort of pressure politicians, you know, get ready to negotiate solutions to this with WADA, rather than stonewalling each other.
Sputnik: Yes, absolutely. Now, why is WADA putting forward its demands despite the fact that the Russian Investigative Committee earlier offered to cooperate with the agency? And how lopsided is the whole situation in your view?
Andy Brown: There is a bit of lopsidedness on both sides. I mean, for a start, WADA has insisted that they provide access to closed cities, Russia says that it has done this. However, if we look at the order implemented by the Kremlin, the implementation order for the national anti-doping plan, it says that only DCOs who are Russian residents will be allowed to access those cities. Now that isn't what WADA asked for. Also, the SKR is answerable to Vladimir Putin, and although it is an investigative committee, questions have to be asked about whether, in this instance, in order to allow Russians to compete, access could be given to the sample still held at the Moscow laboratory and also the database.
Sputnik: What about the facts that WADA appears to be turning a blind eye to the independent tests run by overseas organizations that have proven that doping was used in less than one percent of all cases. Have you got a point of view on that?
Andy Brown: That needs to be taken into account, but that isn't what the Roadmap to Code Compliance asked for. It doesn't actually contain any conditions regarding the current testing regime as such. It requires the two points that it's falling down on, the two previously mentioned: recognition of the findings of McLaren and also access to what's held by the Moscow laboratory. Now, a larger question needs to be asked about this, about whether it's fair for WADA to sort of sanction somebody on such a moralistic point if you like, because essentially the Russian anti-doping agency is performing tests on athletes and those tests are implicating that there's not much doping going on. So are these athletes guilty of doping? No they're not. Like I said, it's the Russian athletes here that are suffering and the reason they're suffering is the political maneuvering on both sides that's going to result in them being excluded from Pyeongchang.
