Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva’s testimony during a hearing before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) was accepted by the arbitrators as fair and credible, but insufficient to acquit her of an anti-doping rule violation. This is reported in the grounds of the court’s decision, which are published on the organization’s website.
“The athlete provided evidence and appeared before the jury. It must be said that the judges found her to be an honest, upright and trustworthy person and her statements of innocence were believable. However, these statements are clearly insufficient for her to be justified for the use of doping”, says the material of the CAS.
The hearings on Kamila Valieva’s case in the CAS were held from September 26 to 28 last year. The court decided to resume hearings on November 9 and 10 due to the need to prepare additional documentation. On November 9, Kamila Valieva was questioned again by the arbitrators.
On January 29, CAS disqualified Kamila Valieva for four years for violating anti-doping rules. She was caught using the banned drug “trimetazidine”. Her sanction comes into force from December 25, 2021, and the results are canceled even after that. On January 30, the International Skating Union revised the results of the team tournament at the Beijing 2022 Olympics, moving the Russian team, which included Kamila Valieva, from first place to third.
The Sports Arbitration Court defined as “untenable” the arguments of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), according to which the words of coach Eteri Tutberidze about the search for “meldonium” analogues indicate the deliberate use of “trimetazidine” by Kamila Valieva.
“Eteri Tutberidze is said to have publicly stated that when ‘meldonium’ was banned in 2016, ‘we had to look for something new’. This could mean anything, and of course provides no compelling basis for concluding that the use of ‘trimetazidine’ in this case was intentional”, ruled the court.
