Pat Hickey says he will be happy to see athletes from Russia and Kenya compete at the Rio Olympics - so long as they the countries prove that they have cleaned up their doping act.
Russian track and field athletes are currently suspended from international competitions after it was found that there was a systematic culture of doping in their set-up.
Kenya is also under close scrutiny, though not yet subject to a ban, following similar findings.
The likelihood is both will be allowed to compete at the Rio Games in August, with the World Anti Doping Agency [WADA] and world athletics’ governing body, the IAAF, set to make a recommendation on their participation in the coming months.
“It’s up to the IAAF and WADA to clear those athletes for participation in Rio,” said Hickey, Olympic Council of Ireland President.
“When they make their decision, they make a submission to the International Olympic Committee and then the International Olympic Committee will make a decision.
“They will more or less go on the recommendation - if it’s positive the decision is likely to be positive and if it’s negative it’s likely to be negative, though I can’t talk about that far down the line.
“I would be happy to see them compete, but only if they clear their hurdles with the IAAF and WADA.”
“Seb was a great athlete, an Olympic champion who quite clearly never dabbled in doping, he has the right values." - Pat Hickey
Seb Coe, British former Olympic champion and chief organiser of the London 2012 Games, is now IAAF President.
He was vice president in the years spanning some of the worst drugs cover-ups in athletics and many feel that he is tainted by association, even if he wasn’t implicated in the scandals. However Hickey says Coe is the right man for the job.
“He was vice president, but there were four or five vice presidents and I know with vice presidents they don't always have information,” he explained.
“They’re not always hands-on. A lot of vice president roles are ceremonial and you don’t really know the day-to-day activities of the thing.
“Seb was a great athlete, an Olympic champion who quite clearly never dabbled in doping, he has the right values, he did a phenomenal job in organising the London Games and I think he’s the perfect man to straighten out the IAAF.
Hickey continued: “Unfortunately, it’s like criminality in civil society - we’ll always have criminals and we’ll always have someone who’ll cheat and try to beat the system in sport. I think that this is a wake-up call and the IAAF under Seb Coe will do a huge job in eliminating that.
“What we have to be careful about is you can’t brand every athlete in Russia a doper - there are a lot of clean athletes there and they deserve a break as well. We must protect the clean athletes.
“I think the campaign is right to set Russia up in a proper system, they are a very important country in Europe and the Olympic movement and I think Seb Coe is the man to lead the charge on that. I think a good solution will come out of this.”
