Beijing Olympics 1,500m winner stripped of gold medal for doping

Beijing Olympics 1,500m winner Rashid Ramzi was stripped of his gold medal as the International Olympic Committee sanctioned five athletes with doping violation on Thursday.

"The International Olympic Committee (IOC) today announced sanctions against five athletes who participated in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing for having committed anti-doping violations," the IOC said in a statement.

The IOC said Bahrain's Ramzi "shall be disqualified from the athletics men's 1,500m event, where he had placed first," and "shall have his medal and diploma in the above-mentioned event withdrawn."

Moroccan-born Ramzi was Bahrain's first Olympic champion but was found using banned substance CERA, a third generation of the endurance enhancing hormone EPO in April.

The IOC carried out further tests on the samples collected at the Games in April "when a fully validated test to detect CERA became available," it said in the statement.

Italian cyclist Davide Rebellin, silver medalist from Beijing Olympics, was also requested to hand in his individual road race silver medal.

The other positive results were from German cyclist Stefan Schumacher, already banned for doping, Greece's 2004 Athens Games 20km walk champion Athanasia Tsoumeleka and Croatian 800 metres runner Vanja Perisic.

The IOC has disqualified the five athletes from the Games, ordered their federations to adjust the final standings in their events and take further action regarding their bans.


Source: Xinhua