International athletics chiefs will start action against Russian athletes caught in doping scandals within three months and said Monday they want a coach at the centre of the scandal kicked out of the sport.
The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) have started full-scale inquiries into the sport in Russia since a German television documentary alleged widespread doping by top athletes.
Thomas Capdevielle, the IAAF anti-doping manager, said "we hope to at least initiate proceedings in the next two or three months on the first individuals."
He added the IAAF could appeal against some sanctions ordered by the Russian Athletics Federation to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the main international appeals tribunal.
Proceedings have already been started against Viktor Chegin, who heads the Russian race-walking centre in Saransk and has trained more than 20 athletes caught for doping in recent years.
Three of the five latest race walkers banned in January were past or present Olympic champions. All were coached by Chegin.
"We are confident it will end in a satisfying conclusion for us," Capdevielle said of the IAAF action against Chegin.
IAAF president Lamine Diack admitted to the BBC also on Monday the sport was facing a crisis although he denied that 99percent of Russian athletes were doping, describing those claims as 'ridiculous'.
"We face a difficult situation in Russia... we have to clean up what is going on in Russia now," said the 81-year-old Senegalese, who has been in charge of athletics for the past 16 years since his dynamic predecessor Italian Primo Nebiolo died.
"OK, in Russia there are some cheaters and if it's demonstrated that cheating is organised we have to take action, not only on the athletes, but on the leaders.
"It's our job to clean all this and take all the measures we have to take.
"It's a crisis, absolutely. We have to put this behind us but we will arrive to make it.
"You cannot leave any doubt about our results. If we come to a situation where people are saying 'what they are doing is not true', what then? So we have to clean."
Diack, who steps down in August and will be replaced by one of two athletic legends in Britain's two-time Olympic 1500m champion Sebastian Coe or Ukrainian pole vaulter Sergei Bubka, rejected claims that the IAAF had been involved in a cover-up.
The IAAF Ethics Commission are presently looking into those claims made in the German documemtary.
"I'm convinced I know my department. I know how they work very, very hard about the fight against doping, and I didn't see any reason to make a cover-up of a doping case," he said.
Diack, a former top class long jumper in his heyday, also expressed his confidence that his son Papa Massata Diack would be cleared by the Ethics Commission.
Diack junior, 50, stepped down from his position as a marketing consultant to the IAAF when the documentary alleged possible corruption linked to the attribution of the 2017 world athletics championships, which was handed to London ahead of Qatar.
"A father is not happy to see his son accused of that, but I am sure that he will clear his name", said  Diack.
Source: AFP