Topic: News: The Greek Doping Scandal

[Matt Erdman]

Konstantinidis's testimony would wrap it up, awful stuff.

Sjaak

Not unless other athletes confirmed it. Technically speaking anyway.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Not unless other athletes confirmed it. Technically speaking anyway.

I have to agree. I don't think it would wrap up anything and a suggestion that it would wrap everything up would lead me to believe this coach is just the scapegoat of a much bigger conspiracy. In my opinion, the truth is probably much more complex. Lets wait and see what happens tomorrow. 

[Jack]

Yes, I didn't mean to point a finger to any individual. For me, the statement makes it more certain that they really have been using doping.

Sjaak

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Link

Chinese drug company shut in doping case

SHANGHAI, China: A China-based drug maker accused in a Greek sports doping scandal has shut down.

The coach of Greece's weightlifting team blamed a faulty batch of diet supplements from China for the scandal, in which 11 team members tested positive for unspecified banned substances last month. The case has shaken Greece, which might not send any weightlifters to the Beijing Olympics this summer.

The accusations again raised concerns about the quality of products made in China. The nation has struggled in the past year with a number of product recalls, including toothpaste that contained a chemical used in antifreeze; lead-tainted toys; and a pet food ingredient contaminated with the toxic chemical melamine.

The Shanghai-based Auspure Biotechnology has been closed temporarily, an official with China's State Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday. He refused to give his name, as is common among Chinese officials.

Auspure's Web site says it is under construction. Phone calls to the company were not answered Wednesday.

However, the state-run China Daily newspaper reported Tuesday that Auspure is not registered as a drug producer with China's SFDA.

Agency spokeswoman Yan Jiangying confirmed that Auspure sent a letter of apology to officials of the Greek team. But she told the newspaper the allegations that Auspure accidentally included banned toxic and cancer-causing substances in the diet supplements have not been substantiated.

While it has installed a state-of-the-art lab to analyze doping samples from the Olympics, China is still reported to be the world's largest supplier of steroids, HGH and other performance-enhancing drugs.

The deal to supply Auspure's drugs to Greece was made online, the director of the SFDA's drug safety supervision department told China Daily.

"The two parties had never met before," Bian Zhenjia said.

Yan said Chinese government agencies are investigating the case.

The 11 Greek team members were scheduled to testify Wednesday before a prosecutor investigating their alleged use of banned substances — a preliminary stage before charges can be pressed.

National weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou has been suspended.

On Tuesday, a court official in Greece said a former member of the Greek team, Christos Constantinidis, accused Iakovou of pressuring him to use banned substances in 1997.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Link

Greek weightlifters testimony postponed

ATHENS, Greece -- A Greek court gave 11 members of the country's weightlifting team until next month to prepare testimonies to a prosecutor investigating their alleged use of banned substances.

The athletes appeared Wednesday morning before prosecutor Andreas Karaflos as suspects in a preliminary stage of court proceedings before charges can be pressed. The court granted their request for more time to prepare, and postponed the date for their testimony until May 2, court authorities said.

The weightlifters tested positive for unspecified banned substances during an out-of-competition test in Athens on March 7, and the test results were announced on April 4. The names of the male and female athletes -- 11 of the national team's 14 members -- have not been published and none have publicly commented on the scandal.

National weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou, who has been suspended, insists a faulty batch of diet supplements from China was to blame for the test results.

He and the weightlifting team's coaches and doctors have been summoned to testify before Karaflos on Thursday and Friday. They are also expected to ask for a postponement.

The company that allegedly supplied the drugs, Shanghai-based Auspure Biotechnology, has been closed down temporarily, an official with China's State Food and Drug Administration official said Wednesday. The official refused to give his name as is common among Chinese officials.

The state-run China Daily newspaper reported Tuesday that Auspure is not registered as a drug producer with China's SFDA.

Agency spokeswoman Yan Jiangying confirmed that Auspure had sent a letter of apology to officials of the Greek team, but told the newspaper that the allegations that Auspure had accidentally included banned toxic and cancer-causing substances in the diet supplements have not been substantiated.

While Iakovou has insisted the blame lies with faulty supplements, a Greek court official said Tuesday that a former member of the Greek team, Christos Constantinidis, accused the coach of pressing him to use banned substances in 1997.

Constantinidis initially made the claims in 1997 before retracting them, and repeated them in testimony Monday before Karaflos, the official said.

The head of Greece's National Organization for Medicines, Vassilis Kondozamanis, has said the organization would soon release a full report on drugs seized last week at an Athens pharmacy as part of the investigation headed by Karaflos.

The scandal threatens to prevent Greece from sending weightlifters -- traditionally strong medal contenders -- to Beijing.

Sports minister Yiannis Ioannidis said last week it was "not likely" Greek weightlifters would compete in the Beijing Olympics, but that the International Weightlifting Federation would make the final decision.

Iakovou, 60, is one of Greece's most successful coaches with his athletes winning five Olympic gold medals, along with five silver and two bronze, since the 1992 Barcelona Games.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Link

Greek weightlifting head coach Iacovou to retire
By Karolos Grohmann, Editing by Trevor Huggins

ATHENS, April 16 (Reuters) - Greece's most successful weightlifting coach, who is at the heart of a doping scandal involving 11 of his top athletes, will retire, a federation official said on Wednesday.

Christos Iacovou, whose athletes won 12 Olympic medals since the 1992 Barcelona Games, including five golds, has been suspended since earlier this month when all but three members of his men's and women's national teams tested positive to banned substances.

The whole team now could be banned from competing in the Beijing Games and the athletes face two-year suspensions as first-time offenders.

Iacovou was temporarily suspended pending an ongoing judicial investigation into the affair that has rocked the country's sporting bodies months before the Beijing Olympics.

"Mr Iacovou came to the federation this morning to collect his employment documents to file for retirement," a federation official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

"He will now retire as he turned 60 last week and will not return as head coach whatever happens in this case," the official said.

Iacovou, 60, once hailed as the brains behind Greece's weightlifting success, which also included hundreds of medals at World and European championships, has seen his reputation shattered in this affair.

He has blamed a Chinese lab for accidentally spiking a batch of nutritional supplements with banned substances. The federation also blames the positive tests on the lab but has also accused Iacovou of failing to follow proper procedures.

Shanghai-based Auspure Biotechnology Co Ltd has admitted sending a letter of apology to the Greeks but according to Chinese media, the State Food and Drug Administration has said the company was not even approved to produce drugs.

A former weightlifter himself, Iacovou took over the national team in the late 1980s, reaping the first fruit of his labour at the 1992 Barcelona Games, where Pyrros Dimas won a gold medal, the first weightlifting medal for Greece since the 1904 Games.

His cries of support to his athletes during their lifts quickly entered into everyday parlance and in the next two Olympics his team garnered another 10 medals, making weightlifting hugely popular in Greece.

But in front of a fiery home crowd at the Athens 2004 Olympics his "Dream Team" came up short with only one medal and a dented image after an athlete had to return his bronze medal following a positive drugs test.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Link


Greek weightlifters testimony postponed
By Fanis Karabatsakis

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- A Greek court gave 11 members of the country's weightlifting team until next month to prepare testimonies to a prosecutor investigating their alleged use of banned substances.

The athletes appeared Wednesday morning before prosecutor Andreas Karaflos as suspects in a preliminary stage of court proceedings before charges can be pressed. The court granted their request for more time to prepare, and postponed the date for their testimony until May 2, court authorities said.

The weightlifters tested positive for unspecified banned substances during an out-of-competition test in Athens on March 7, and the test results were announced on April 4. The names of the male and female athletes -- 11 of the national team's 14 members -- have not been published and none have publicly commented on the scandal.

National weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou, who has been suspended, insists a faulty batch of diet supplements from China was to blame for the test results.

He and the weightlifting team's coaches and doctors have been summoned to testify before Karaflos on Thursday and Friday. They are also expected to ask for a postponement.

Charalambos Likoudis, a lawyer representing 10 of the 11 athletes, said outside the courthouse that his clients had "total trust'' in their coach and were "certain that each day that passes, evidence will come to light that will lead to their exoneration.''

Alexis Cougias, a lawyer representing the 11th athlete, a woman, claimed that the team had not comprehended the full extent of the accusations against them.

"They haven't understood that those accusing them have put them in the same category as those who gave them the drugs,'' he said, adding that the athletes "would under no circumstances have accepted to take these substances if they had known that their lives and health was in danger.''

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Link

Greek weightlifters given until May to prepare testimony

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- A Greek court Wednesday gave 11 members of the country's scandal-tainted weightlifting team until next month to prepare testimonies to a prosecutor investigating their alleged use of banned substances.

The athletes appeared Wednesday morning before prosecutor Andreas Karaflos as suspects in a preliminary stage of court proceedings before charges can be pressed. The court granted their request for more time to prepare, and postponed the date for their testimony until May 2, court authorities said.

The weightlifters tested positive for unspecified banned substances during an out-of-competition test in Athens on March 7, and the test results were announced on April 4. The names of the male and female athletes -- 11 of the national team's 14 members -- have not been published and none have publicly commented on the scandal.

Suspended national weightlifting coach Christos Iakovou resigned Wednesday, his lawyer Michalis Dimitrakopoulos told The Associated Press.

Iakovou, 60, had been due to retire after the summer Beijing Olympics.

Iakovou insists a faulty batch of diet supplements from China was to blame for the test results. He and the weightlifting team's coaches and doctors have been summoned to testify before Karaflos as suspects on Thursday and Friday. They are also expected to ask for a postponement.

Charalambos Likoudis, a lawyer representing 10 of the 11 athletes, said outside the courthouse that his clients had "total trust" in their coach and were "certain that each day that passes, evidence will come to light that will lead to their exoneration."

Likoudis said his clients "feel only love for their coach and father."

Alexis Cougias, a lawyer representing the 11th athlete, a woman, claimed that the team had not comprehended the full extent of the accusations against them.

"They haven't understood that those accusing them have put them in the same category as those who gave them the drugs," he said, adding that the athletes "would under no circumstances have accepted to take these substances if they had known that their lives and health was in danger."

The company that allegedly supplied the drugs, Shanghai-based Auspure Biotechnology, has been closed down temporarily, an official with China's State Food and Drug Administration official said Wednesday. The official refused to give his name as is common among Chinese officials.

The state-run China Daily newspaper reported Tuesday that Auspure is not registered as a drug producer with China's SFDA.

Agency spokeswoman Yan Jiangying confirmed that Auspure had sent a letter of apology to officials of the Greek team, but told the newspaper that the allegations that Auspure had accidentally included banned toxic and cancer-causing substances in the diet supplements have not been substantiated.

While Iakovou has insisted the blame lies with faulty supplements, a Greek court official said Tuesday that a former member of the Greek team, Christos Constantinidis, accused the coach of pressing him to use banned substances in 1997.

Constantinidis initially made the claims in 1997 before retracting them, and repeated them in testimony Monday before Karaflos, the official said.

The head of Greece's National Organization for Medicines, Vassilis Kondozamanis, has said the organization would soon release a full report on drugs seized last week at an Athens pharmacy as part of the investigation headed by Karaflos.

The scandal threatens to prevent Greece from sending weightlifters -- traditionally strong medal contenders -- to Beijing for the Olympics.

Sports minister Yiannis Ioannidis said last week it was "not likely" Greek weightlifters would compete in the Olympics, but that the International Weightlifting Federation would make the final decision.

Iakovou is one of Greece's most successful coaches with his athletes winning five Olympic gold medals, along with five silver and two bronze, since the 1992 Barcelona Games.