Events

Alexander Lukashenko remarked: “The idea to ban athletes, who use doping, from taking part in Olympics, is debated all over the world. Certainly, we should toughen punishments for such violations but it is only one facet of the problem. The other one is that we have to be ready to wisely resist unwarranted pressure.”

The head of state reminded that Belarusian weightlifters and rowers had been accused of doping. The rowers had been denied participation in the Rio Olympics. “They could have won medals there. Knowing the overall situation, we should have acted to forestall such an outcome. Some of the complaints of the International Olympic Committee have been neutralized but it turns out that on the global scale the sport federations are not ready to protect themselves. They know neither international procedures nor what they have to do in an emergency. We talked about it during the previous conference,” noted the president.

“Nobody needs proof these days. They need only pretense. The policy of punishments first and investigations later is in use,” pointed out Alexander Lukashenko. “At last there is the simple lack of discipline. Our problems in rowing and taekwondo have a lot to do with complacency and slackness. Our athletes travel abroad for training and fail to follow basic safety rules.”