Russian
drug cheats will be competing at next month's Olympic Games despite efforts to
eradicate them, say the whistleblowers who highlighted the country's
state-sponsored doping.
The
International Olympic Committee has asked governing bodies to ban Russians
either implicated in a recent report into doping, or previously sanctioned.
But
former Russian Anti-Doping Agency official Vitaly Stepanov and his 800m runner
wife Yuliya told BBC Sport: "There will be athletes who have used
doping from Russia in Rio."
The
pair were forced to flee Russia after their evidence put the country's doping
record under intense scrutiny but said they "feel safe" in
their new home at a secret location.
"Unfortunately
the reaction to our actions in our home country is not positive,"
Vitaly said.
"A lot of people in general and
athletes as well hate us for what we did and we would not go back to Russia
right now. There, we would feel unsafe."
The
Stepanovs gave evidence to a German documentary maker in 2014 that led to an
independent report being commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency which
found evidence of widespread doping.
That
in turn led to another Wada-commissioned report - last week's McLaren report -
which detailed extensive attempts to cover up doping in Russia and implicated
the Russian ministry of sport, secret service and anti-doping agency.
The
IOC decided against enforcing a blanket ban on Russian sportspeople for Rio,
despite calls for tough action in the wake of the McLaren report.
Instead,
the IOC said it would be up to individual sports federations to decide which
athletes were eligible for Rio. So far, 37 athletes across six sports have been
banned since the IOC made its decision.
That
is in addition to athletics' governing body, the IAAF, already opting to ban
Russian track and field athletes from the competition unless they can satisfy
strict doping criteria. So far, only one athlete has been able to do that.
"The IOC showed that first of all
there is no punishment for running a systematic doping programme in the largest
country in the world,"
Vitaly said.
"And second, they protected not
the majority of clean athletes globally, but they protected clean athletes in
Russia."
The
Stepanovs were speaking just a day after criticising the IOC for banning
Yuliya, 30, from Rio.
Despite
being cleared to compete under a neutral flag by the IAAF, the IOC ruled she
should not be allowed to take part because she was sanctioned for doping in
2013.
The
Stepanovs said this sent out the wrong signal to potential whistleblowers, with
Vitaly saying:
"You didn't really have a choice
if you wanted to be a member of the national team.
"She has served her ban, fully
served her ban, she thinks that she should not be punished a second time for
something that she did in the past."
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