Anti-doping bodies planning to demand Russia be banned from Rio Games
Ten countries and 20 athlete groups reportedly set to make the request
They are waiting for the findings from a WADA investigation to be released
Russia's athletics team has already been banned over state doping saga
Anti-doping officials from at least 10 countries and as many as 20 athlete groups are reportedly planning to demand Russia's entire team be banned from the upcoming Olympic Games in Rio.
The extraordinary request could be issued as early as Monday, the New York Times reports, and is in response to explosive allegations from earlier this year that claimed the country ran a state-sponsored doping program.
The newspaper claims it has emails outlining the potential push to have Russia sidelined, which would come just weeks before the Games are due to get underway in Brazil.
Pictured are athletes from Russia's team at the Sochi Games in 2014
National doping agencies for the U.S., Canada, Japan, Germany, New Zealand, Spain, and Switzerland are some of those reportedly set to call for the expulsion.
The countries and agencies are waiting for the results of a World Anti-Doping Authority investigation into Russia's alleged doping regime to be revealed.
It is due to be released in Toronto on Monday.
In a leaked draft letter addressed to the International Olympic Committee, which will be sent once the report into Sochi led by Canadian law professor Richard McLaren is presented, United States Anti-Doping Agency CEO Travis Tygart calls for a ban on all Russian athletes, not just in track and field.
'We write on behalf of a community of clean athletes and anti-doping organizations with faith that the IOC can lead the way forward by upholding the principles of Olympics,' said the draft letter signed by Tygart and Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sports CEO Paul Melia.
'Therefore, consistent with the Principles, Charter and Code we request that the IOC Executive Board take the action to suspend the Russian Olympic and Paralympic Committee from participating in the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.
'The only appropriate, and permissible, course of action in these unprecedented circumstances is for the IOC to immediately suspend the Russian Olympic and Paralympic Committees from the Olympic Movement.... and declare that no athlete can represent Russia at the Rio Olympic Games.'
IOC President Thomas Bach said last month that individual Russian track and field athletes assessed as clean would be able to compete for their country in Brazil.
'My concern is that there seems to have been an attempt to agree an outcome before any evidence has been presented,' IOC Executive Board member Patrick Hickey said.
'Such interference and calls ahead of the McLaren Report publication are totally against internationally recognized fair legal process and may have completely undermined the integrity and therefore the credibility of this important report.'
It comes after the IAAF announced last month the ban on Russia's track and field team would keep athletes out of action in Rio.
As a result, for the first time since they boycotted the Los Angeles Games in 1984 the world's largest country will be absent from athletics, the jewel in the crown of the biggest sporting event on the planet.
With relations between Russia and the rest of the world more strained than at any point since the Cold War, the ramifications of this decision are untold but few could argue with the reasoning behind it.
For two days last month, the 24 voting members of the IAAF council balanced the evidence and every one of them decided Russian athletes have no place at the Olympic Games.
Russia has been banned from international competition since last November when a report by Dick Pound, the former head of the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) found evidence of an entrenched culture of cheating and state sponsored doping.
An IAAF taskforce of five investigators, led by Norwegian Rune Andersen, set out to investigate whether they had managed to rebuild a broken testing programme and show its officials, coaches and athletes were not still flouting anti-doping rules.
Russia has denied the allegations of a state-organized doping regime
