August 08, 2008	Friday	Sha’aban 5, 1429

ATHENS, Aug 7: Controversial Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou should not be barred from the Beijing Games, the head of Greek athletics said on Thursday as the International Olympic Committee was set to decide on the issue.

“Thanou has met the competition requirements and has no disciplinary sanction pending against her,” Greek athletics federation (SEGAS) chairman Vassilis Sevastis told private Skai Radio.

Sevastis said it was “great hypocrisy” that the IOC was pondering whether to exclude Thanou from the Games over a doping rule violation four years ago when other athletes actually caught using banned drugs are being allowed to compete.

“I don’t think there is sufficient legal basis to exclude Thanou,” he said.

The IOC insists on examining the right of Thanou, silver medallist in the 100 metres at the 2000 Games, to compete in Beijing because of a doping test controversy on the eve of the 2004 Olympics in Athens.

The 33-year-old rocked the last Games when she and fellow Greek sprinter Kostas Kenteris failed to turn up for a dope test and claimed they had a motorcycle accident which landed them in hospital.

Both later turned in their accreditation and were provisionally banned in 2004 by athletics’ world governing body the IAAF, sitting out competition for more than two years before eventually admitting to having missed three dope tests prior to the Athens Olympics.

SEGAS had originally cleared the athletes of any wrongdoing.

The IOC says it has summoned Thanou regarding charges of “disrepute and prejudice caused to the Olympic Movement” and also over issues regarding an ongoing perjury trial in Greece pertaining to the alleged motorcycle accident.

A decision by the IOC disciplinary committee had initially been expected on Thursday but this is now slated for Friday, Thanou’s lawyer Nikos Kollias said.—AFP