The Western Campaign against Russian and Chinese Athletes

The Western Campaign against Russian and Chinese Athletes

Rick Sterling will discuss the banning of Russian athletes beginning with the 2016 Rio De Janeiro Summer Olympics and continuing through banning Russian participation in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. He will analyze the "state sponsored doping" accusations that have been made by the World Anti-Doping Agency. What are the accusations and what is their credibility? Who is Grigory Rodchenkov and what role has he played?

Rick will also discuss the case of Sun Yang, probably the most famous Chinese athlete. Sun Yang has won many international swimming events and holds the world record in the 1500-meter event. In 2019, Sun Yang was found to have committed an anti-doping rule violation and was banned from international competition for 8 years. The case was appealed to the highest court adjudicating international sports. In a ruling that shook the swimming world, the court overturned the decision because of racist tweets by the Italian head judge. These tweets were revealed in Rick's article as will be discussed. Sun Yang's lawyers used this information to successfully challenge the decision. There will be a new hearing with new judges.

Rick will put these cases in the context of the politicization of athletics and western efforts to attack Russia and China in this international arena.

Rick Sterling is active in Task Force on the Americas (https://taskforceamericas.org/) and Mount Diablo Peace and Justice Center (https://ourpeacecenter.org/).

He researches and writes articles on diverse subjects - from the campaign to save the City College of San Francisco, to Syria, to international sports.

He can be reached at rsterling1 [AT] gmail [DOT] com

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