Russian Athletes to Find out Olympic Participation Decision.
ALLEN: Welcome back. In a few hours, Russia's track and field athletes will find out whether they can compete at the Rio Olympics this summer. The team was banned from international competition after allegations that Russia sponsored widespread doping. Our senior international correspondent Matthew Chance has been reporting on this story and he joins us now live from Moscow. Matthew, hello.</s>CHANCE: Thank you very much. Well, I guess it's judgment day for Russia's track and field athletes. That decision again to be taken in Vienna later on today, to decide whether or not the Russians have done enough to convince the world athletic governing body, the AII -- sorry, the IAAF, that they've done enough to make sure that they're clean and fit and able to compete at the Rio Olympics, which of course starts in just a few weeks from now. But let me tell you, amid all the recent allegations, it's fair to be it is going to be a difficult race to win. Not even Russia's fastest can outrun the latest doping allegation. Already the entire track and field team is banned from international competition. But hopes that suspension would be lifted ahead of the Rio Olympics have been dealt a powerful blow. In a new devastating report, the World Anti-Doping Agency, WADA, charges Russia, with among other things, obstructing drug testing. Accusing athletes of providing false information about their whereabouts, and avoiding drug tests at competition. In one case, the report says an athlete even attempted to give a fake urine sample from a container inserted inside her body. It's more bad news for Russian athletes, with no history of cheating, hoping for Olympic gold.</s>SERGEY SHUBENKOV, 110 METERS HURDLES WORLD CHAMPION: I'm training with my coach and there's nothing I can do about other people having violated the rules of competing or something else, or taking dope. I cannot do anything about it. So, how can I be claimed responsible for other people's deeds?</s>CHANCE: In a bid to have the Olympic ban lifted, Russia has vowed a total revamp of its anti-doping facilities. Even opening up the notorious labs at the center of earlier doping allegations. They showed us the urine samples they've kept frozen. Russia hopes this impression of transparency will be enough. Although the latest WADA report suggests things may not have changed enough. Well, this is rare access to the labs at the center of Russia's doping scandal. It's in these rooms it's alleged that hundreds of samples went missing in what the World Anti-Doping Agency says was a state sponsored program of doping. For the moment, work has all been suspended as being carried out elsewhere, but the Russians say they're determined to rebuild trust. But trust is one thing even the Russian says can't enhance. Not helped by the fact their former anti-doping chief fired amid allegations of officials taking bribes from athletes to shield them from positive tests. Unexpectedly died of apparent heart failure. And his testimony will never be heard. And the party line is now denial. Speaking to CNN, his former deputy, the new acting head, said she had no knowledge of the wrongdoing of which Rusada is accused.</s>CHANCE: So, do you admit that the agency took bribes to cover up doping?</s>ANNA ANTSELIOVICH, RUSSIAN ANTI-DOPING AGENCY ACTING DIRECTOR: I can't admit, no.</s>CHANCE: Because you don't know it to be true, or you refuse to admit it in.</s>ANTSELIOVICH: I've never taken any bribe.</s>CHANCE: Do you know people who did?</s>ANTSELIOVICH: No.</s>CHANCE: You worked under five years under your predecessor?</s>ANTSELIOVICH: No. I didn't know such facts.</s>CHANCE: As the Olympic decision approaches, Russia sporting super power had been quietly confident of a return, but it's now all quite possible this will be as close to Rio as Russia's top flight athletes ever get. Well, I guess we'll know for sure in about eight hours from now, Natalie, when the IAAF meets in Vienna to hear the recommendations that will be given to it by its officials and to make its decision on whether or not one of the world's biggest sporting nations, Russia will be able to compete at the world's biggest sporting event.</s>ALLEN: And does it involve just the track and field athletes?</s>CHANCE: The ban just involves the track and field athletes. It's just them that have been suspended. And so that's what the decision will be about today, whether or not they can compete at the Rio Olympics. But the most recent WADA allegations in that newest report don't just -- aren't just about track and field athletes, they talk about other athletes in other disciplines as well. So, there's a potential that this whole investigation, this whole scandal could widen even further.</s>ALLEN: All right, we'll be waiting to see what happens in a few hours. Matthew Chance, you'll be covering it for us. Thank you very much. And our Fareed Zakaria is interviewing Russian President Vladimir Putin. Don't miss that interview, you can watch here on CNN on Sunday at noon in London, 7 p.m. in Hong Kong. After this, more of our top story, the death of Jo Cox, how colleagues are remembering her, not only as a great lawmaker, but as a great person.