This archive report was first published on 11 June 2020.
Published on June 11, 2020, in Paris, France, Lamine Diack, the former head of global track and field, testified in his corruption trial that he had agreed to delay and stagger investigations into suspected Russian doping cases for the sake of the sport's financial health.
Diack, who served as the president of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) from 1999 to 2015, admitted that bans were delayed in order to allow the Russian athletes concerned to compete in the 2012 London Olympics and the World Athletics Championships in Moscow the following year.
According to Diack, the aim was to prevent the cases from derailing talks with prospective Russian sponsors, including state-owned bank VTB and the RTR broadcaster.
Prosecutors, however, say Diack directly or indirectly demanded Sh390 million ($3.9 million) from Russian athletes in order to have their names cleared.
Diack's decision to delay imposing bans, under an operation described as 'full protection', allowed some of the Russians to win medals at the London Olympics.
During the trial, Diack refused to be drawn on allegations that he obtained $1.5 million of Russian funds to help back Macky Sall's campaign for the 2012 Senegal presidential election in exchange for covering up or delaying offences by the Russian athletes.
