Bach wants lifetime bans for drugs cheats

Bach was speaking ahead of the release of the second part of the McLaren report, commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate the issue of doping.

Thomas Bach, the president of the IOC, believes anyone found guilty of being involved in systematic doping should be banned for life.

Bach was speaking ahead of the release of the > second part of the McLaren report , commissioned by the World Anti-Doping Agency to investigate the issue of doping.

The second part of that report is due to be published on Friday, and Bach expressed his desire to see permanent suspensions for any person found to be in violation of the regulations.

"If you ask me for a private opinion then personally, if for instance you have an athlete being part of such a manipulated system and benefiting from the system, my consequences would not differ from the ones we took under my chair in the disciplinary commission concerning Austria," he said.

"This means clearly for me, if an athlete or official would be part of such a system, I would not like to see this person at any Olympic Games in whatever function. Not as an athlete or a coach or as an official.

"This for me would present aggravated circumstances there. For me the logical consequence would be a life ban and an exclusion from the Olympic Games for life.

"I think we have already shown our reaction on how we will deal with the report. As soon as we have the report it will be handed over to the commissions. They then will take contact with Professor McLaren and will do their work immediately."

The IOC came under severe criticism for its perceived failure to take a strong stance after revelations of state-sponsored performance-enhancing drug use among Russian athletes on the back of the first part of the McLaren report.

Rather than prevent all Russian competitors from featuring in Rio, the IOC left it up to each international sport federation to make a call.