Russia replies as IAAF consider doping sanctions
Vladimir Put / Russian President Moscow (AFP) - Russia sent a formal reply to damaging allegations of "state-sponsored" doping to world athletics' governing body on Thursday as the IAAF prepared to consider suspending the track and field superpower. "We have just sent our account to the IAAF," the acting president of Russia's athletics federation Vadim Zelichenok told TASS news agency. Russian athletics was placed firmly in the doping dock and risked exclusion from next year's Rio Olympics after the explosive accusations contained in Monday's World Anti-Doping Agency report which rocked the Olympic's flagship sport. Russia's immediate fate on the international stage is to be determined by athletics chief Sebastian Coe and the 27-strong IAAF council in a video-conference call meeting starting at 1800GMT on Friday. Zelichenok told the R-Sports agency that Russia's athletics authorities had produced th...