Prosecutors
allege he solicited 3.45 million euros ($3.89 million) from athletes suspected
of doping to cover up the allegations and allow them to continue competing,
including in the 2012 London Olympics.
Lamine Diack,
the former head of athletics’ governing body, goes on trial in Paris on Monday
on charges of corruption and money laundering linked to a Russian doping
scandal.
Diack, who
turned 87 on Sunday, has denied wrongdoing. His lawyers have said the
accusations are baseless.
Diack, from
Senegal, led the governing IAAF, now renamed World Athletics, from 1999-2015
and was among the most influential men in the sport.
He lives
under house arrest in Paris and faces a jail sentence of up to 10 years if
convicted.
The trial had
been due to start in January but was postponed after new documents containing
testimony from his son and co-defendant, Papa Massata Diack, were submitted to
the court.
Senegal has
refused to extradite Papa Massata, who worked as a marketing consultant for the
IAAF.
He also faces
charges of money laundering, corruption and breach of trust, according to the
indictment, and will be tried in absentia.
The other
defendants are Habib Cisse, Diack’s former lawyer at the IAAF; Gabriel Dolle,
who oversaw doping tests at the IAAF; and Russians Valentin Balakhnitchev and
Alexei Melnikov, who were Russia’s athletics’ federation chief and head
athletics coach respectively at the time of the alleged cover-up.
Investigators
at the French National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) describe a web of
corruption in world athletics under Diack’s leadership.
In a separate
case, French prosecutors are investigating alleged bribes related to the
Olympics and World Athletics Championships.
They suspect
Tokyo’s bidding committee bribed the Diacks in 2013 to secure votes, which the
committee has denied.
Sebastian
Coe, Diack’s successor, has undertaken to rebuild trust in athletics and has
introduced changes to the sport’s governance.
Reuters/NAN
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