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The Paralympics get underway on September 7th and run until the 18th in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, but Russia won’t be competing in them. The nation has been banned from the event due to widespread state-sponsored doping allegations. The IPC (International Paralympic Committee) banned the country last month, but Russia then appealed to the CAS (Court of Arbitration for Sport) in Switzerland. They didn’t have any luck though as the ban was upheld and it covers all Russian Paralympians. The IPC originally banned the country after a report outlined the doping scandal.

The CAS said it will publish all of the details in the near future, but said the IPC was justified in banning Russia from the athletic competition. The IPC presented facts of the doping scandal to the CAS and the Russian Paralympic Committee wasn’t able to dispute them. It may seem a little odd that disabled athletes in wheelchairs etc. are banned from competing while Russia was allowed to take part in the recent Olympic Games even though the country’s athletes were also implicated in the doping scandal. But this is basically because the IOC (International Olympic Committee) didn’t have the courage to ban the nation from the event.

Instead, the IOC banned specific athletes from the Olympics even though WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) recommended the entire Olympic team be banned. The federations of each individual sport were allowed to decide which athletes could compete at the Olympics and the IOC had the final ruling. The entire Russian athletics team ended up being banned, but over 270 athletes from Russia still competed in the Olympics. The country finished in fourth place in the medal standings after capturing a total of 56 of them. Russia was hoping to take 267 athletes to the Paralympics to compete in 18 different sports.

The Russian federation said it could appeal the decision with the Supreme Court in Switzerland, but the case wouldn’t be heard for a year or two. The IPC stated that it hopes the ban will lead to a drug-free athletic program in Russia since the current system is compromised and corrupted. The Russian government said the individual athletes shouldn’t have to pay for the mistakes made by the country’s Paralympics Committee. They believe coaches and officials should be punished, but not innocent athletes. The Russian Paralympic team won 80 medals at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia with 30 of them being gold.

However, an independent report by WADA found that urine samples of Russian athletes and Paralympians had been manipulated between the years 2011 and 2015. The report stated that some urine samples had been swapped for clean ones at the 2014 Olympics and Paralympics. The 2016 Paralympics will still take place even though ticket sales are slow and Brazil is struggling to fund the Games. Fellow athletes and Paralympians from other nations support the ban on Russia as they feel the Olympics and Paralympics should be drug-free.