Russian Minister of Foreign Affiars Sergei Lavrov on Thursday said Moscow has “many questions” over the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) ban on meldonium after tennis star Maria Sharapova admitted testing positive for the drug.
“The recent situation where there is such a flurry of bans and accusations against our leading great athletes raises many questions,” Russia’s top diplomat said in an interview with REN TV.
“I consider that in response to professional questions, there should follow professional explanations” from WADA,” Lavrov said in a rare comment on Russian sport.
Photo: AFP
Sharapova, a five-time Grand Slam singles champion, on Monday admitted she had tested positive for meldonium at the Australian Open in January.
WADA’s ban on the drug — which Soviet soldiers fighting in Afghanistan in the 1980s took to increase their endurance — came into force on Jan. 1.
Russian authorities have hinted that the ban on meldonium, which was created in then-Soviet Latvia, unfairly targets athletes from the former USSR, where the drug is widely available.
“Maybe meldonium was unlucky to have been born in Soviet Latvia?” Lavrov said.
“Had this happened after Latvia became part of the so-called ‘civilized’ world, maybe meldonium would have had a different fate?” he said, referring to Latvia’s EU membership.
A report by a WADA independent commission published in November last year alleged state-sponsored doping and mass corruption in Russian athletics, prompting the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) to provisionally suspend Russia.
Moscow has pledged to undertake sweeping reforms to revamp its scandal-ridden anti-doping system.
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