Kamila Valieva: Russian figure skater banned for four years by Court of Arbitration for Sport

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Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva has been found guilty of an anti-doping violation by Switzerland’s Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and has received a four-year ban from competitions.

The ban, which ends a long-running saga between anti-doping bodies and the 17-year-old Valieva, is backdated to December 25, 2021.

Following the figure skating team event at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, it emerged that the then-15-year-old had tested positive for trimetazidine, a heart medication which can boost endurance.

In its announcement on Monday, the CAS said that the ban includes “the disqualification [of] all competitive results” achieved by Valieva since the positive test.

In Beijing, Valieva’s Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) team had finished first ahead of the US and Japan – with Canada finishing fourth – and no medals were subsequently awarded due to the doping controversy.

In its statement, the CAS said that it had no “scope” to decide what will happen to the final standings of the team event, adding that this lies with other sporting bodies.

“The consequences linked to the retroactive disqualification of Ms Valieva from past events, including from the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, were not within the scope of this arbitration procedure and will have to be examined by the sports organisations concerned,” the CAS said.

CNN Sport has contacted the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the US Olympic Committee, the Japanese Olympic Committee, and the Canadian Olympic Committee for further comment.

In December 2022, a Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) commission said that Valieva bore no “fault or negligence” for the positive test from the previous year, while the skater has also said that the drug was ingested accidentally.

However, RUSADA’s ruling was appealed by the IOC and the International Skating Union (ISU), and even a portion of the decision was appealed by RUSADA itself.

RUSADA had changed its initial stance and sought a punishment that “may include or be limited to a reprimand” for Valieva, CAS announced in February last year.

CNN has reached out to the ROC and ISU for comment on Monday’s ruling.

In its latest announcement, CAS said that the decision is “final and binding,” but added that the parties can appeal to the Swiss Federal Tribunal “within 30 days on limited grounds.”

CNN’s Jill Martin and Thomas Schlachter contributed to reporting.