(Reuters) - Kazakh weightlifter Nijat Rahimov, who won gold in the 77kg at the 2016 Rio Olympics, has been banned from the sport for eight years for a doping offence and will be stripped of his medal, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) said on Tuesday.
Rahimov, 28, was found guilty of four urine substitutions, which amounts to the "Use of a Prohibited Method" under International Weightlifting Federation's anti-doping rules.
"In January 2021, further to a WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) investigation ("Operation Arrow") into irregularities in sample collection in the sport of weightlifting, the International Testing Agency (ITA), served a Notice of Charge on Nijat Rahimov," CAS said in a statement.
"The Sole Arbitrator found Nihat Rahimov to be responsible for four urine substitutions which constitute ADRVs (Anti-Doping Rule Violations) of “Use of a Prohibited Method” under Article 2.2 of the IWF Anti-Doping Rules.
"The Sole Arbitrator determined that the appropriate sanction would be an eight-year period of ineligibility and the disqualification of all competitive results from 15 March 2016."
Rahimov, who also won gold at the world championships in 2015, was previously banned for two years in June 2013 after testing positive for anabolic steroids.
(Reporting by Dhruv Munjal in Bengaluru; Editing by Ken Ferris)
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