WADA to File Complaint With CAS Over RUSADA's Decision to Lift Valieva's Suspension

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said on Friday that it plans to lodge an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) on the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) decision to lift the temporary suspension of Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva.

"The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) wishes to confirm that it intends to lodge an appeal with the … CAS in relation to the anti-doping case involving a Russian Olympic Committee figure skater who tested positive for a prohibited substance in an event prior to the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing," WADA said in a statement, adding that it has a right to "appeal the decision" of RUSADA on lifting the provision suspensions.

Earlier this week, RUSADA Disciplinary Anti-Doping Committee lifted the athlete’s provisional suspension that had been imposed on her amid the controversy surrounding her doping test in late December, and she was allowed to continue her participation in the Winter Olympics in Beijing.

On 8 February, the International Testing Agency said that "a sample from the athlete was collected under the testing authority of the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) on 25 December 2021 during the 2022 Russian Figure Skating Championships in Saint Petersburg, Russia. The WADA-accredited laboratory of Stockholm, Sweden, reported that the sample had returned an Adverse Analytical Finding (AAF) for the non-specified prohibited substance trimetazidine...on 8 February 2022". The agency explained that trimetazidine is a banned heart medication.

Kamila Valieva,15, is the current Russian and European champion in figure skating, who holds world records in both the short and free programmes. During her free programme at the Beijing Olympic Games, she performed a quadruple salchow, as well as a quadruple toe-loop with a combination with triple toe-loop, earning 178.92 points and becoming the first female figure skater in history to land a quad jump at the Olympics.