IOC officials accuse US of doping cover-ups

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Sydney: International Olympic Committee (IOC) officials on Monday accused the United States of covering up doping cases among US athletes for more than a decade.

IOC's medical chief Prince Alexandre de Merode told reporters five American athletes had competed at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul despite failing dope tests before the Games.

His revelations came after IOC vice-president Dick Pound said areliable source had told him American world shotput champion C J Hunter had tested positive for the steroid nandrolone in Oslo on July 28.

On Friday, the International Amateur Athletic Federation's (IAAF) top anti-doping official Arne Ljungqvist claimed US athletics chiefs had failed to explain 15 suspicious drug tests among their athletes in the past two years.

IOC athletics commission member Johann Olav Koss, the former Norwegian Olympic speed skating champion, called on the US sport's governing body to be more open about dope tests. ''These athletes should not be protected,'' he said on Monday.

De Merode said the IOC had learned that five US athletes failed out-of-competition tests in the united states before the Seoul Games, but that the results had never been passed on to the IOC.

Asked if he felt a cover-up had taken place, he said, ''Yes, certainly. I don't know if something like that has happened this time but it would not surprise me. It would not be the first time.''

De Merode said he could not name the athletes involved in Seoul and did not know whether they had been medallists.

Ljungqvist told Reuters in an interview that the USA Track and Field (USATF), who govern athletics in the US, had not informed the IAAF of suspicious cases because of the confidentiality rules.

''The problem is when we investigate reports we receive from the Indianapolis laboratory, we find cases on which we have not beeninformed - that have been reported positive from the lab or possibly positive.

''We have found 15 cases that we have no information on...this has been like this for years. The same story. It is an eternal headache.''

Koss said, ''The athletes have the feeling that the IAAF and USATF are covering up and have a special rule for american athletes. It is a big problem. The USATF have to be more open. You can't have a situation where in one place you go free and in another place you have a life ban. It's not how the system should work.''

The USATF were not available for comment on Monday. United States Olympic Committee spokesman Mike Moran said, ''I have no comment onthat at this time.''



(c) Reuters Limited.