This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

The International Association of Athletics Federations has laid out guidelines for Russian athletes who wish to take part in international competition this year.

The Russian Athletics Federation remains suspended over state-sponsored doping, with the head of the IAAF taskforce set up to assess Russia’s anti-doping progress, Rune Andersen, reporting last month the country was not ready to return to the fold.

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Russian athletes can apply to the IAAF for individual permission to compete, as the long jumper Darya Klishina did at the Rio Olympics last summer, albeit with the aid of the court of arbitration for sport.

The IAAF has sent updated guidelines for such athletes to the Russian Athletics Federation. Athletes have to prove they are “not directly implicated in any way (knowingly or unknowingly) by their national federation’s failure to put in place adequate systems to protect and promote clean athletes”.

Other criteria include: whether a member of an athlete’s entourage has ever been implicated in doping; how many anti-doping samples an athlete has provided; if there has been any time when they were not subject to testing by a recognised body; if there have been any concerns about their biological passport profile; if they have any historical samples being retested.

The IAAF said it has been sent around 200 names of Russian athletes by the McLaren investigation team, who uncovered the extent of the country’s doping programme across sport.

It added it would “assess the evidence and intelligence from the McLaren report and elsewhere in respect of any athlete who applies for neutral athlete status”.

The IAAF said athletes applying for the right to compete did not necessarily have to have been tested outside of Russia, but stressed they “must have been part of a recognised, independent and fully Wada code-compliant drug-testing programme for a sufficiently long period to provide substantial objective assurance of integrity”.

There are now more than 60 Russian athletes in the IAAF International Registered Testing Pool – for athletes who have been satisfactorily tested by the IAAF and/or other independent testing agencies – but being part of that does not guarantee athletes permission to compete.

Applications for permission will be considered by the IAAF’s doping review board.