Moscow: Doping allegations against Russia are an attempt to brand Moscow part of an “axis of evil”, Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko said on Friday ahead of his country’s possible expulsion from the Winter Olympic Games.
“This is an attempt to create an image of an axis of evil. But this is all because we are such a great sport superpower,” said Mutko, who was barred from attending the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio over the drug cheating scandal.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will meet on Tuesday to decide whether to ban Russia from the 2018 Winter Games in South Korea’s Pyeongchang over allegations that it ran a state-sponsored doping programme for years.
Russia has already lost its top ranking in the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic Games after being stripped of 11 medals for cheating.
Mutko, who served as sport minister from 2008 to 2016, also chairs Russia’s 2018 World Cup organising committee and was speaking at a press conference ahead of Friday’s draw in the Kremlin for the group stage of the showpiece June 14-July 15 competition.
Dominating a press conference held jointly with the FIFA president Gianni Infantino, he said Russia “played by the rules” and added that he expected the IOC to presume Russia’s innocence going into Tuesday’s meetings.
He said the government would defend its athletes “to the last bullet”. AFP
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