Thanou banned from Beijing Olympics

Beijing: Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou has been barred from competing in the Beijing Games because of her involvement in a doping scandal four years ago, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said on Sunday.

Thanou and fellow Greek sprinter Costas Kenteris were at the heart of the biggest Olympic doping affair in years when they missed a drugs test just before the Athens 2004 Games.
The case brought the Olympic movement into disrepute, the IOC said.

Returning from a ban, Thanou qualified for Beijing but needed IOC approval to compete.

Accepting it

"Upon receiving the recommendations of the IOC's disciplinary commission, the executive board has declared Miss Thanou ineligible to participate in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games," IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies said.

She said the decision was meant "to send a firm signal of the IOC's moral consideration that this case has brought the Olympic movement very much into disrepute".

Greece's Olympic Committee said it had no choice but to accept the IOC's decision.

"This is an IOC ruling, based on its Olympic charter," Committee President Minos Kyriakou said.

"We just have to accept it and that's it."

Thanou and Kenteris were banned until December 2006 for violating anti-doping rules after missing the drugs test on the eve of the Athens Games.