Russia has been suspended from athletics by the sport's world governing body over doping claims.
The International Association of Athletics Federation president Sebastian Coe had given the Russian athletics federation until the end of this week to respond to allegations of widespread state-sponsored doping.
The country's athletics stars could now miss the Rio Olympics next year.
The full statement has now been released on the IAAF website...here's the opening statement... pic.twitter.com/Q3yhlmDjh2
— ByTheMin Athletics (@ByTheMinAthlete) November 13, 2015
In a statement, the IAAF confirmed that 22 members of the council voted in favour of sanctioning Russia, with one opposed.
"The Council of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) has provisionally suspended the All-Russia Athletic Federation (ARAF) as an IAAF Member with immediate effect.
The decision was taken at today’s 201st IAAF Council Meeting which was held by teleconference and chaired from London by IAAF President Sebastian Coe.
A total of 24 Members of Council took part in the meeting: 22 voted in favour of the sanction against ARAF, who have been officially informed of the Council’s decision, 1 voted against. The Council Member from Russia was not eligible to participate in the vote."
Commenting on developments, Coe said: "Today we have been dealing with the failure of ARAF and made the decision to provisionally suspend them, the toughest sanction we can apply at this time. But we discussed and agreed that the whole system has failed the athletes, not just in Russia, but around the world.
"This has been a shameful wake up call and we are clear that cheating at any level will not be tolerated. To this end, the IAAF, WADA, the member federations and athletes need to look closely at ourselves, our cultures and our processes to identify where failures exist and be tough in our determination to fix them and rebuild trust in our sport. There can be no more important focus for our sport."
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