LONDON (AP) – IOC President Thomas Bach says international Olympic officials will try to find “the right balance between collective responsibility and individual justice” in dealing with Russian doping ahead of the games in Rio de Janeiro.
Bach says “the right to individual justice applies to every athlete in the world.”
Bach spoke in a telephone interview Wednesday with The Associated Press and two other international news agencies.
His comments came five days before the release of a report by Canadian law professor Richard McLaren into allegations of a state-sponsored Russian doping conspiracy at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi.
Bach says “it is obvious that you cannot sanction or punish a badminton player for infringement of rules or manipulation by an official or lab director in the Winter Games.”