RUSSIAN athletics should be suspended from all competition, including the 2016 Olympic Games, a damning report by World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) independent commission into widespread doping and corruption urged Monday.

    “The IC (Independent commission) has recommended that the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federations) suspend ARAF (Russian athletics federation),” concluded the report set up to investigate the scandal that has rocked athletics, the flagship sport of the Olympics.

    The long-awaited findings of former WADA chief Dick Pound’s three-man commission claimed Russian doping “could not have happened without government consent.”

    WADA, which called for five Russian athletes, including 800 meters Olympic winner Mariya Savinova, to be given lifetime bans, suggested the presence of doped athletes had “sabotaged” the 2012 Games in London.

    The report, which said “systematic doping” extended beyond Russia and athletics, also wants to see Moscow’s anti-doping laboratory stripped of its accreditation and its director fired.

    IAAF president Sebastian Coe, giving his first reaction in London, said in a statement that the report’s conclusions were “alarming” but he had begun the process “of considering sanctions against ARAF.”

    “We need time to properly digest and understand the detailed findings included in the report,” Coe said. “However, I have urged the Council to start the process of considering sanctions against ARAF.”

    In a first reaction, Russia’s Sports Minister Vitali Mutko said that the WADA commission cannot take the decision to suspend Russia from competition.

    “There is no need to get confused, the commission does not have the right to suspend anyone,” Mutko told RIA Novosti news agency, saying Russian authorities would release a fuller statement later.

    (SD-Agencies)