IOC bans six Russian female ice hockey players for life

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has issued its latest set of sanctions against the Russian national women's ice hockey team for alleged doping violation of consuming banned substances. Despite the Russian Olympic Committee’s decision to allow “individuals to compete as neutral” rather than declaring complete boycott, the IOC is continuing to crack down doping in Russia.

“The six athletes are declared ineligible to be accredited in any capacity for all editions of the Games of the Olympiad and the Olympic Winter Games subsequent to the Olympic Winter Games Sochi 2014,” the IOC said in a statement on its website on Wednesday. According to the statement, the six players’ records will be deleted completely and they will be banned from the Olympics for life. The Russian national women's ice hockey team, which finished sixth at the Sochi Olympic Games, will also be disqualified. This is the first time in the history of the Olympics to disqualify an Olympic team.

One of the sanctioned players was the Russian national women's ice hockey team leader, Yekaterina Smolentseva, who has participated in four Olympic games. The other banned players are Inna Dyubanok, Ekaterina Lebedeva, Ekaterina Pashkevich, Anna Shibanova and Galina Skiba. Most of them participated the 2017 IInternational Ice Hockey Federation Women's World Championship that was held in April in the United States and were highly likely to participate in the PyeongChang Winter Olympics. Accordingly, a total of 31 Russian athletes, who were linked to the Sochi Olympic Games, have been sanctioned for doping.

Russia is now disgraced as the first country to have more than 100 athletes among all events banned from playing in the Olympic Games. As the doping investigation is not over yet, more athletes may be caught for doping, the IOC stated.

Jae-Hyeng Kim monami@donga.com