Russian bank VTB to end partnership deal with IAAF
Russian bank VTB will not be extending its partnership contract with the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), the world governing body announced on Thursday (November 12).
The bank is currently listed as one of seven 'Official IAAF Partners' on the IAAF website, along with Adidas, Canon, Seiko, Sinopec, TDK and Toyota.
VTB was the first Russian company to sign a sponsorship contract with the IAAF when an original five-year deal from 2007 to 2011 was agreed in 2006.
"VTB has expressed no interest to extend its present contract, the last event of which was the IAAF World Championships in Beijing," read a statement from the IAAF. "The contract will come to a natural end in 2015."
The announcement comes after a World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) Independent Commission published a report detailing findings including a "deeply rooted culture of cheating" in Russian athletics.
The Independent Commission, which is chaired by WADA’s founding president Dick Pound, was formed after the broadcast of an ARD documentary – ‘Top-secret doping: How Russia makes its winners’ – in December 2014.
Speaking of the decision not to renew VTB's contract with the IAAF, VTB first deputy president Vasily Titov is reported to have told the RIA Novosti news agency: "We did not plan to renew it. This has nothing to do with the doping scandal in any way."
