RUSADA's former executive director is the second senior official to die following a recent corruption scandal.
ADVERTISEMENTThe former executive director of Russia’s anti-doping agency RUSADA has died two months after resigning his post over a cheating and corruption scandal.
The agency said Nikita Kamayev, who was 52, is thought to have suffered a heart attack.
Another ex-senior executive Ramil Khabriev, who also stood down, said Kamayev had complained of feeling unwell after going skiing.
“He complained of heartache after a skiing session. He has never complained about heart problems, at least to me. Maybe his wife knew about such problems,” Russian news agency TASS quoted Khabriev as saying.
Kamayev is the second former senior RUSADA official to die this month. Founding chairman Vyacheslav Sinev, who ran the agency from 2008 to 2010, died on February 3.
Russia was provisionally suspended from international athletics by the International Association of Athletics (IAAF) Federations in November after a report by a commission from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) accused RUSADA of covering up cases of drug taking by leading Russian athletes.
The Russian agency had already been stopped from carrying out drugs tests.
Kamayev vehemently defended the organisation, saying it had been fighting drugs use effectively.
But the following month he and Khabriev resigned as Russia began working on lifting the ban ahead of this summer’s Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.