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Sorry to be the bringer of (more) bad news...

Turkey’s doping scandal grows as 15 new athletes tested ‘positive’

Fifteen Turkish athletes tested positive for doping substances days after similar accusations were made regarding eight Turkish weightlifters, according to Anadolu Agency.

Five athletes competing in the European Team Championships had previously been accused of doping, and the list became longer today with additional names. Eşref Apak, Kaan Şencan, Elif Yıldırım, İsa Can, Umut Aday, Ummuhani Karaçadırlı, Fatih Eryıldırım and Narin Kahraman became the latest athletes to have tested positive for banned substances.

Turkish Athletics Federation chairman Mehmet Terzi admitted that 24 athletes were suspected with doping this year.

Terzi added that the federation’s battle with doping will continue, claiming that doping figures “will go minimum by September.”

Officials called on all athletes on the list to withdraw if they were currently competing in the Mediterranean Games.

If the athletes face punishment following further procedures, Turkey may lose points as a team, after landing in the ninth spot in the European Teams Championship.

The scandals regarding doping by Turkish athletes have been coming one after the other since Olympic champion Aslı Çakır Alptekin and European champion Nevin Yanıt also faced allegations of doping, though no official confirmation came regarding either of the athletes. The star athletes were also suspended from international competition by the International Association of Athletics Federation.

Eight weightlifters were left off the Turkish national squad ahead of the Mediterranean Games, which started June 20 in Mersin, after testing positive for doping.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkeys-doping-scandal-grows-as-15-new-athletes-tested-positive.aspx?pageID=238&nID=49626&NewsCatID=371

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It really is remarkable the way that Istanbul's bid has imploded. What a mess.

It is hardly good news, but I'd stop short at catastrophising the entire bid based on this.

While it is yet more bad publicity for the Istanbul bid to deal with - it is not a direct indicator that the bid is any way unable to deliver the current plan that they have tabled - or if the swagger of emotive forces behind an Istanbul bid are not at play.

Comparisons to the Spanish case are not appropriate - that was the systematic destruction of evidence. If anything, this is immensely poor timing for news like this to come out - but take a step back, most prominent countries have had their share of doping scandals - China, Spain, Canada and right now Australia (take a look at what is going in within our football leagues)

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  • 2 weeks later...

More here....

Drug scandal rocks Turkey who could be thrown out of World Championships as 'dozens' of athletes test positive

Turkey is at risk of being thrown out of next month's World Championships in Moscow after "dozens" of its athletes tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in a series of recent anti-doping raids last month.

As part of a target-testing operation carried out by the International Association of Athletics Federations, large numbers of Turkish athletes were drug-tested both in and out of competition in the run-up to the Mediterranean Games, which were held in the Turkish city of Mersin from June 20-30.

The results of the anti-doping operation have yet to be made public but the number of positive cases is said to run into dozens.

"We’re talking about a lot of athletes," said a senior athletics insider. "It could be as many as 30."

It is understood that the athletes have all failed tests on their 'A' urine samples and are now waiting for the test results from their 'B' samples. Only then will the cases be publicly revealed, though a formal announcement is expected within days.

If the adverse findings are confirmed - and it is very rare for a 'B' sample to contradict the result of the 'A' - then it would represent one of the biggest ever doping exposes in athletics within a single country.

The decision of the IAAF to target Turkish athletes for drug tests follows a series of high-profile recent doping cases involving the country's track and field stars.

In May, it was announced that Asli Cakir Alptekein, who won gold in the women's 1,500 metres at the London Olympics, had been provisionally suspended after abnormalities were detected in her blood profile that indicated she had been cheating.

If found guilty of a drug violation by a disciplinary tribunal, she will be stripped of her Olympic title and banned for life, having already served a two-year suspension for doping.

Another of Turkey's most decorated athletes, two-time European 100m hurdles champion Nevin Yanit, was also charged with a drug violation in May after testing positive for a prohibited substance.

Last week, the crisis within Turkish athletics deepened when it was revealed that a further eight of its athletes were facing doping charges, including Esref Apak, the 2004 Olympic hammer silver medallist, who finished third at last month's European Team Championships in Gateshead.

Alarmed at the possibility of more Turkish athletes testing positive at the World Championships, it is understood the IAAF sent a team of drug-testers to Turkey in a preemptive strike.

The world governing body operates a global "registered testing pool" of elite athletes who are subject to out-of-competition testing, 18 of whom are Turkish, but the recent raids were focused more on second-tier athletes outside the elite pool.

The scale of the doping problem in Turkey is said to be so serious that the IAAF could now take the ultimate step of suspending the Turkish athletics federation and barring its athletes from competing at the World Championships, which begin on Aug 10.

...

Even if the Turkish federation escapes suspension and is free to send a team to Moscow next month, the latest doping revelations threaten to do untold damage to Istanbul's bid to host the 2020 Olympics.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/athletics/10168329/Drug-scandal-rocks-Turkey-who-could-be-thrown-out-of-World-Championships-as-dozens-of-athletes-test-positive.html

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Thank God I resisted temptation when I was musing plumping money on them with the bookies a few months back. I agree with Barcelona - this has got to be one of the biggest bid collapse since NYC was left stadium-less a month or so before the 2012 vote.

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I think it is now safe to say that Istanbul Turkey bid is now dead in the water Turkey will not get the Olympics Games in my life time and I am only 19 I think that Baku Azerbaijan will get the 1st Olympics Games in the Islamic world in 2028 at least they are being smart by getting big multi sporting event, Istanbul never hosted an multi sporting event before, Baku Azerbaijan is hosting the 2015 EURO Games and bidding for the 2019 Summer University Games if they not get 2019 then they will get 2021 Games Brasilia Brazil is most likely going to get the 2019 event then I think that Baku Azerbaijan will be the prime host for the 2028 Olympics Games.

Turkey is becoming unstable and there foreign policy has failed even in there region which is not good at all while Azerbaijan is becoming the new Turkey of the middle East.

This is very amusing stuff the fall of the Istanbul Turkey Olympics Bid I think no city bidding for the Olympics Games has gone from the favourites to becoming a dead bid I think Turkey will not get the Olympics Games not for another 100 years.

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This is a level of systematic doping unseen since the 80's and early 90's. Pissing off the most powerful and well-represented IF within the IOC is not a good move. You now have Gosper, Drut, el Moutawakel, Fredericks, Szewinska, Diack, Bubka, and Borzov who will be unlikely to support Istanbul. And likely any Presidential candidate and Dick Pound. 17 votes seems like a stretch now.

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Tokyo Japan will be getting the 2020 Summer Olympics and Paralympics Games hands down now I think that they will get it 1st round of voting, Madrid Spain is bankrupted and Spain get a big doping problem like Turkey has well so 2020 is going to Tokyo Japan.

Madrid Spain is not bankrupted, and the doping issue is not that big as Turkey's. However, Tokyo is the most compelling option two months ahead the voting.

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The spate of doping cases in Turkey should help — rather than harm — Istanbul's bid for the 2020 Olympics, the head of the country's national Olympic committee said Wednesday.

"The increase in the number of doping cases ... shows that Turkey is fighting doping, and in my opinion, will affect the Olympic bid positively, not negatively," Ugur Erdener said.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/turkish-official-doping-cases-harm-2020-bid-19624498#.Ud13aKwufEZ

Blimey, what with the protests "strengthening" their bid and now this positive boon Istanbul 2020 must be unbeatable!

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Thank God I resisted temptation when I was musing plumping money on them with the bookies a few months back. I agree with Barcelona - this has got to be one of the biggest bid collapse since NYC was left stadium-less a month or so before the 2012 vote.

This is much bigger than New York 2012, IMO. Even with a stadium, New York was never a front-runner in that race and was not given much of a chance to win. Istanbul was at the very least a co-favorite with Tokyo, and it was probably the clear front-runner when the protests started a few months ago.

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Tokyo Japan will be getting the 2020 Summer Olympics and Paralympics Games hands down now I think that they will get it 1st round of voting, Madrid Spain is bankrupted and Spain get a big doping problem like Turkey has well so 2020 is going to Tokyo Japan.

You have a complete ignorance... Spain has more money than Turkey. We won't grow until late 2014 or 2015 but it is not a poor country and we don't have the same circumstances as Greece. Our problem is that international press say things which are not true. Spain will recieve this year record of international tourists.
Spain has better relations with many countries than Turkey or Japan and the anti-doping law has been already changed.
We are not in bankrupted. Take care of what you are saying. Learn about foreign cultures, global economy and world geography -_-
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  • 3 weeks later...

Turkey needs to "clean their house" if Istanbul 2020 is to win bid, IAAF President warns

Turkey's Government needs to do more to demonstrate that it is dealing with its country's doping problem if Istanbul's bid to host the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics is to be successful, International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) President Lamine Diack has warned.

More than 30 Turkish athletes have failed drugs tests in the past year, including last year's Olympic 1500 metres champion Asli Cakir Alptekin, and Diack has told senior Government officials that the situation is seriously jeopardising their bid.

"They cannot bid for the Olympics if they cannot control their athletes," said Diack, who is also a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

"I'm not saying we get rid of the Federation but they need to clean their house."

Diack held talks with Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan earlier this month in Lausanne, where Istanbul gave a presentation on their bid to IOC members, along with rivals Madrid and Tokyo, ahead of the final vote in Buenos Aires on September 7.

"It's not the Olympic Committee or the [athletics] Federation who must solve the problem - it's the Government," said Diack.

"I have already talked to them [the Government].

"They asked me, as an IOC member, what my advice would be

"I said, 'Look, there is an important issue - it is that you have to finish with doping.'

"I told them that if they are going to win the bid I think you need to take care of this big issue.

"They are bidding for the 2020 Olympics but every few days we have three or four athletes caught for doping."

The National Olympic Committee of Turkey (NOCT) promised that they were taking the problem seriously and that the spate of positive recent tests demonstrated that they were being more vigilant, although in the case of Alptekin it was the IAAF who caught her following abnormalities with the athlete's biological passport.

"Turkey is totally committed to making our anti-doping procedures among the best in the world, so of course we take any advice we receive from senior members of the Olympic Family on this subject extremely seriously," they said in a statement to insidethegames.

"Unfortunately recent events have shown that doping is still a global issue, and Turkey is no exception.

"But more cases in Turkey is not evidence of more cheats - it is evidence that we are stepping up to fight this problem more aggressively and coming in to line with top-tier sports nations.

"The national Government is leading this fight from the front and coordinating a major nationwide effort to find and expel cheats from Turkish sport, in conjunction with International Federations and WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency).

"In the short-term, the redoubling of TADA's (Turkish Anti-Doping Agency) testing and sanctioning procedures will mean more positive tests. But in the long-term, thanks to an extensive government-led education programme, the numbers will level out and decline.

"Our Olympic bid has been an added extra stimulus for this process; our seven-year preparation process would accelerate it even further.

"We want clean young Turkish athletes winning medals on home soil in 2020."

A senior figure in Turkish sport told insidethegames that the fight against doping was being continually stepped up, led by Uğur Erdener, President of the NOCT and the representative of the Association of Summer Olympic International Federations (ASOIF) on the WADA Executive Committee and Foundation.

"It's clear that for some time Turkey's anti-doping programme lagged behind its sporting aspirations," the source said.

"But it seems that it's now being put right - for three main reasons.

"First of all, you have the leadership of the Turkish NOC and its strong connections with WADA.

"Secondly, there's the country's long-standing Olympic ambitions: Turkey must be seen by the international sports community not just to be paying lip-service to zero-tolerance, but to be actively and rigorously enforcing it.

Finally, the success of this intensified testing programme and the spike in positive tests has, I think, caused a growing realisation in the government that this has the potential to effect Turkey's standing in world sport and beyond.

"They will be keen to take action to ensure that effect is positive.

"Obviously this is not an experience they are keen to repeat in the glare of the media spotlight."

Insidethegames

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