BOA declared 'noncompliant' by WADA

MONTREAL (AP) — The British Olympic Association's lifetime ban on drug cheats was declared "noncompliant" with global anti-doping policy by the World Anti-Doping Agency on Sunday.

The decision was voted on at WADA's foundation board meeting and came at the end of a week in which WADA and the BOA exchanged barbs in a public spat between two major sports organizations.

WADA president John Fahey said he was "very disappointed that it's come to this."

A BOA bylaw from 1992 bars British athletes from the Olympics for life if they are found guilty of doping. Britain, which will host the 2012 London Olympics, is the only country that has such a rule.

In a statement, the BOA said it "looked forward to receiving the formal findings from WADA setting out how they have determined the BOA's Selection Policy is noncompliant with the World Anti-Doping Code."

However, the association made it clear that it would resist being forced to drop its lifetime ban.

"On behalf of the overwhelming majority of British athletes we will vigorously defend any challenge to the selection policy which bans drug cheats from representing Team GB and we will publish the process we intend to follow in the near future," the BOA said.

That process is set to involve taking the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

BOA chairman Colin Moynihan said last week that its board of directors had agreed at a meeting to inform WADA that "it will vigorously defend the interests of clean athletes by seeking a hearing before the CAS to address the enforceability of its selection policy, and bring clarity and closure to this issue."

Among British athletes covered by the ban are sprinter Dwain Chambers, the former European 100-meter champion who served a two-year ban in the BALCO scandal, and cyclist David Millar.

Sunday's decision by WADA increases those athletes' chances of becoming eligible to compete in their home Olympics next summer in London.

In a separate barbed exchange, Moynihan accused WADA last week of failing to catch the world's biggest drug cheats and dragging the doping fight into a "dark age."

Those comments clearly still rankled with Fahey on Sunday.

"We had their decision conveyed to us through a vitriolic spray in a speech that was circulated to everyone except us earlier this week," he said.

As for the BOA turning to CAS, Fahey acknowledged that right existed and was "a matter for the BOA.

"We can only send our report. Anyone who is aggrieved or feels that any decision taken by the WADA board is not right has a right of appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport so that is open to them if they should choose."

The BOA's bylaw has been under fire since CAS nullified the International Olympic Committee's rule that would have banned any athletes who received a doping suspension of more than six months from competing in the next Games.

The court ruled that the IOC provision amounted to a second sanction and did not conform with the WADA Code, which sets out rules and sanctions for all sports and countries.

The ruling cleared American 400-meter runner LaShawn Merritt, who completed a 21-month doping ban in July, to defend his Olympic title in London next year.