World Swimming Federation confirms US federal investigation into doping tests of Chinese swimmers

GENEVA (AP) — The International Swimming Federation said its top official has been asked to testify as a witness in a U.S. criminal case involving 23 Chinese swimmers who failed doping tests In 2021 they were still allowed to compete.

The news comes just three weeks before the Paris Olympics, which will feature 11 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for the banned heart drug three years ago.

The swimmers won three gold medals for China at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, just weeks after the World Anti-Doping Agency declined to challenge Chinese authorities’ explanation of food contamination at a hotel as the basis for their non-ban.

These decisions, which World Aquatics also made separately, were only announced in April through reports in the New York Times and the German broadcaster ARD.

A House Committee on China asked the Department of Justice and FBI on May 21 to investigate the case under a federal law that allows investigations into alleged doping conspiracies even if they occurred outside the United States.

World Aquatics confirmed to the Associated Press on Thursday that CEO Brent Nowicki has been subpoenaed to testify in the investigation.

“World Aquatics can confirm that its executive director, Brent Nowicki, has been served with a subpoena from the U.S. government,” the association said in a statement to AP. “He is working to arrange a meeting with the government that will, in all likelihood, eliminate the need for him to testify before a grand jury.”

World Aquatics declined to answer questions about where and when Nowicki was served with his subpoena, nor did it say which office is conducting the investigation.

“Consistent with our usual practice, the FBI does not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation,” the bureau said in an email response Thursday.

The case of the Chinese swimmers could become the most spectacular use yet of a US federal law passed in 2020 as a result of Russia’s long-running scandal of state-sponsored doping in sports.

The 23 swimmers tested positive for trimetazidine in January 2021 and were recorded in the global anti-doping database weeks later. They included Zhang Yufei, who later won Olympic gold in the women’s 200-meter butterfly and 4×200-meter freestyle relay, and Wang Shun, the men’s 200-meter individual medley champion.

A later investigation by Chinese authorities revealed that traces of the substance were found in the kitchen of a hotel where the team was staying. How and why the drug, which was prescribed in tablet form, got there was not explained.

WADA accepted the theory This allowed Chinese swimmers to continue competing, and the incident has since been described as “a relatively clear-cut case of mass contamination.”

The agency has since defended his handling of the case, which was kept secret in 2021, on the grounds that there was no way to independently disprove the theory during the COVID-19 pandemic, when travel to China was not possible.

WADA lawyers said in April this year they did not have evidence to win separate appeals against the 23 swimmers ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. Any appeals seeking the swimmers’ bans would have been heard at the Court of Arbitration for Sport, where Nowicki long served as lead counsel before joining World Aquatics in 2021.

“This scandal raises serious legal, ethical and competitive concerns and may represent a broader state-sponsored strategy by the People’s Republic of China to compete unfairly at the Olympic Games, as Russia has done before,” the Chinese Communist Party’s special committee said in a letter to the Justice Department and FBI.

The case was also raised at a congressional hearing last month, where swimming fans Michael Phelps said athletes had lost confidence in WADA as a global regulator that tries to keep cheaters out of the sport.

Representatives of the Montreal-based agency declined an invitation to the hearing, saying it would be “inappropriate to be drawn into a political debate before a U.S. Congressional committee about a case from another country, particularly while an independent investigation into WADA’s handling of the case is underway.”

This review report is still pending. former prosecutor in the Swiss canton of Vaud, seat of the International Olympic Committee and the governing bodies of many Olympic sports.

Travis Tygart, head of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, told the Associated Press that an ongoing federal investigation could create “fear among sports officials traveling to the U.S. that they may have to answer questions from the FBI about their activities.”

The United States will host the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. in Paris on 24 July The IOC should confirm Salt Lake City as the host city for the 2034 Winter Olympics.

The Rodchenkov Anti-Doping Act, named after a whistleblower who exposed Russian state-sponsored doping, was passed with bipartisan support and received widespread support from the global sporting community as it aims to criminalize doping.

However, WADA lobbied against the risk of exceeding the powers that could be delegated to the US federal authorities and the The IOC also expressed concerns.

The Rodchenkov Act, Tygart said, “was passed in 2021 with broad support from athletes, sports and multinational governments because WADA could not be trusted to be a strong, fair global regulator that would protect clean athletes and fair sport.”

___ Pells reported from Denver, Colorado.

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