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Cycling: UCI cave in over Lance Armstrong commission

 

Tuesday 29 January 2013 00:00 GMT
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Lance Armstrong faces his trial by celebrity TV on Oprah
Lance Armstrong faces his trial by celebrity TV on Oprah

The International Cycling Union (UCI) has disbanded its own independent commission set up to investigate any alleged involvement the UCI may have had in the Lance Armstrong doping scandal. Instead it promised to establish the "truth and reconciliation process" which many critics had pushed for.

The commission was set up to look into the allegations made against cycling's world governing body by the United States Anti-Doping Agency's (Usada) investigation into Armstrong, which shone a light on a decade of drug use in the sport.

However, both the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) and Usada said they would take no part in the commission and that, according to the UCI, would have led to any report being dismissed as "not being complete or credible".

The UCI president, Pat McQuaid (above), said: "We have listened carefully to the views of Wada, Usada and cycling stakeholders and have decided that a truth and reconciliation process is the best way to examine the culture of doping in cycling in the past and to clear the air so that cycling can move forward."

McQuaid continued: "Given this development, the UCI management committee today decided that the federation could no longer fund a procedure whose outcome is likely to be rejected by such an important stakeholder. We have therefore decided to disband the independent commission with immediate effect."

The Wada president, John Fahey, expressed his concern with the commission earlier this month, and claimed it would not be allowed "to conduct a proper and independent investigation".

The truth and reconciliation process will launch later this year with a final report to be published in full.

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