"Today, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) submitted a formal request to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) that the hearing to resolve the dispute related to the non-compliance case against the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) be held in public", WADA said in a press release.
According to WADA Director General Olivier Niggli, the latest "case of non-compliance" has prompted huge interest around the globe, and the dispute at CAS should be held in a public forum to ensure that everybody would be able to follow the arguments.
On 9 December, WADA's Compliance Review Committee labelled RUSADA as non-compliant with the World Anti-Doping Code.
The agency launched compliance proceedings against the RUSADA back in 2015, accusing it of a large-scale state-funded doping scheme. Another non-compliance procedure was launched later in September 2019 over alleged data manipulation.
The Russian Investigative Committee obtained evidence in December showing that former head of Russia's national anti-doping laboratory Grigory Rodchenkov had modified doping probes data of Russian athletes in 2015-2016. However, WADA did not allow Rodchenkov to be questioned on the matter.
Commenting on the events, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that any punishment concerning the case should be individual and that all Russian athletes should not bear responsibility for the wrongdoing of some.
