Possible twist in Chinese doping affair WADA investigates new suspicions following ARD research
At the start of the Olympic Games, the World Anti-Doping Agency has seen how its handling of suspected doping cases in China has led to a massive loss of trust. Now it is examining new evidence from ARD.
Shortly after the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games, the China case may be picking up speed again after a three-year delay. The investigative departments of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the International Testing Agency (ITA) have, upon request, viewed previously unknown information from the ARD Doping Editorial Team about China. The ITA is responsible for doping controls at the Olympics as well as in World Aquatics, the swimming global governing body.
These documents connected to the 23 Chinese swimmers suspected of doping since the beginning of 2021 challenge the theory put forward by the Chinese Anti-Doping Agency (CHINADA) to exonerate them. If the authenticity of these documents is confirmed, it would increase the pressure on WADA to subject the case - which it has already shelved - to a serious investigation.
Argument for acquittal refuted?
The 23 Chinese swimmers, including reigning Olympic and world champions, had tested positive for the heart medication trimetazidine, which is banned in sport for its performance-enhancing benefits, by CHINADA in January 2021. However, they were never suspended, not even provisionally. Instead, CHINADA had prepared a report with the help of a Chinese Government agency that certified that the swimmers had eaten food contaminated with the drug in a shared hotel. All the swimmers were secretly cleared. WADA approved the findings. It never made the case public.
In the documentary “Doping Top Secret: Dirty Games”, the ARD Doping Editorial Team presented documents that contradict the explanations of the Chinese officials, particularly on one central issue. Contrary to the official account, chat messages from people close to the Chinese athletes claim that not all 23 swimmers stayed in the same hotel. If this is true, contamination of all swimmers who tested positive through food in the hotel's restaurant would be practically impossible and the central argument for the acquittal would be refuted.
Threats from athletes
The incident has put a considerable strain on the start of the Olympic Games. Among the athletes in Paris, confidence in a reliable, globally uniform anti-doping campaign in general, and in WADA, in particular, has been significantly impaired. WADA also lost a great deal of credibility among German swimmers.
“It's just a shame. I have to trust in the system,” said German 100m freestyle record holder Josha Salchow before his Olympic debut. ”The system has to work, and everything has to be done for that. And if that's not the case, then in the long run the athletes will have to stand up to it somehow.”
The German team is even directly affected in that 11 of the 23 Chinese swimmers suspected of doping are also registered in Paris. For example, a German athlete like Melvin Imoudu had to compete against two of the Chinese athletes affected in 2021, Jiajun Sun and Haiyang Qin, the reigning world record holder in the 200-meter breaststroke.
“Cracks in the anti-doping fight”
“In my opinion, this incorrect processing has led to cracks in the fight against doping,” says Christian Hansmann, sports director of the German Swimming Association. Obviously, “the same standards” were not applied here, he claims, adding: “And some athletes are disadvantaged as a result, who may now come third or fourth or fifth, as there are still 11 Chinese athletes competing here.”
Other organisations in the anti-doping fight make far more intensive efforts than WADA to clarify matters when they are confronted with a case of a positive doping sample for trimetazidine that is allegedly based on contamination. Just a few days ago, the investigative unit of the World Athletics Association, the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU). suspended Kenyan marathon star Lawrence Cherono for seven years.
Cherono had also cited unintentional ingestion of the heart medication. The AIU had finally provided evidence in painstaking detail that the clinical documents submitted to it, which were supposed to prove Cherono's contamination, were “not genuine”, i.e. falsified.
Gag clause imposed
Instead of just six weeks like WADA, the AIU took almost two years for the investigation and questioned Cherono several times, while WADA has apparently still not spoken to the swimmers concerned after three years. The shocks caused by the China earthquake have long since reached the Olympics of the sporting world.
The International Olympic Committee who, as the largest single financier are the shadow power behind WADA, has imposed a gag clause on the Americans when awarding the 2034 Olympic Games to Salt Lake City. According to this clause, they are threatened with having to return the Olympic Games if they continue to attack the World Anti-Doping Agency or undermine its rules.
Tygart: “Global anti-doping system is crumbling”
This is a remarkable, albeit empty, threat. Over a third of the 14 largest IOC sponsors come from the USA. The country is set to host the Games twice in the coming decade (Los Angeles 2028 and Salt Lake City 2034), and its television broadcaster NBC is, with seven billion euros paid for the Olympic rights, a major contributor to the five-star life of the Lords of the Rings
Without the regular and lavish transfers from United States, the Olympics money machine would have to go into unchecked begging mode. The legal move is therefore seen more as a somewhat clumsy attempt to tame vocal North American critics of WADA. “The global anti-doping system under the leadership of WADA is crumbling,” Travis Tygart, chief executive of the United States Anti-Doping Agency, told the ARD Doping Editorial Team.
Tygart describes WADA as the “lapdog of the IOC”. He warns: “What we can do at this moment is stand up for our rights and ensure that the system is improved so that we are not robbed on the world stage and the same rules apply to all athletes.”