Former athletics chief Diack guilty of doping corruption

PARIS: The former head of athletics’ world governing body, Lamine Diack, was on Wednesday found guilty by a French court of corruption in covering up Russian doping cases and sentenced to four years in prison, of which two years were suspended.

Diack, an 87-year-old Senegalese who led the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), now renamed World Athletics, for 16 years was also fined 500,000 euros ($600,000).

The presiding judge in the court in Paris, Rose-Marie Hunault, said Diack’s actions had “caused serious damage to the fight against doping”.

She said that despite the sentence, he was unlikely to go to prison.

“Given your age you can expect conditional release,” she said.

Diack said he would immediately lodge an appeal.

His son, Papa Massata Diack, a former marketing consultant for the IAAF, who was tried in absentia because Senegal refused to extradite him, was also found guilty and sentenced to five years in prison and fined one million euros.

Previously one of the most influential figures in world sport, Diack was president of the IAAF from 1999 to 2015 until he was replaced by Britain’s Sebastian Coe in August 2015.