IAAF COULD SUSPEND SOTOMAYOR BEFORE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS

LONDON - Javier Sotomayor, who tested positive for cocaine at
the Pan American Games, still hopes to defend his high jump title at
the World Championships this month.

But track and field's world governing body said Monday that it could
ban Sotomayor from the Aug. 20-29 championships in Seville, Spain, if
Cuban officials don't take any action by then.

While Sotomayor faces a possible two-year ban, no suspension has yet
been imposed and his status for the World Championships remains uncertain.

"I am thinking about going," he told Cuban reporters over the
weekend.

Giorgio Reineri, spokesman for the International Amateur Athletic
Federation, said it is up to the Cuban track federation to hold a
hearing with the two-time world champion and world record holder and
decide whether or not to suspend him.

The Cuban government, meanwhile, raised doubts about tests that showed
two gold medalist weightlifters -- William Vargas, winner in the
136.4-pound weightlifting class, and Rolando Delgado, the 152-pound
class winner -- testing positive for anabolic steroids.

Cuba has charged Sotomayor's positive test was part of a larger
campaign to discredit the Communist government -- possibly by the CIA
or Miami exiles. It has suggested that the track star's food or drink
may have been laced with the drug.

In the case of the weightlifters, the National Institute of Sports,
Physical Education and Recreation said Cuban sports authorities will
launch an investigation "aimed at clarifying whether this is another
dirty trick against our country or if this anabolic substance really
exists in the bodies of said athletes."

The institute said that Cuban sports doctors never use anabolic
steroids for athletes. "In capitalist societies they are commonly used
in professional sports and are distributed without any limitation,"
the statement added.

The IAAF is waiting to see what action Cuba takes, particularly in the
case of Sotomayor.

"If they don't act, if they don't suspend the athlete, the IAAF can
suspend him," Reineri said in a telephone interview from Monaco.

He said the IAAF Council, the world federation's decision-making body,
could suspend Sotomayor at its meeting in Seville next Monday. One of
the Council members is former Olympic 800-meter champion Alberto
Juantorena, head of the Cuban athletics federation.

The case gets more complicated if the Cubans hold a hearing and decide
to clear Sotomayor. In that event, the IAAF could be forced to let him
compete in Seville pending its own review of the case.

In that case, any suspension would be retroactive, meaning that
Sotomayor would be stripped of any medal he won in Seville.

In an interview Monday in the Italian sports daily La Gazzetta dello
Sport, Sotomayor continued to proclaim his innocence.

"The tests can be manipulated," he was quoted as saying from his home
in Havana. "Do you think I would need to take drugs, to dope myself to
jump 2.30 meters? In warmups, I was jumping 2.25. Anyway, it would be
crazy to dope myself at the Pan American Games."

Sotomayor said he was continuing to train daily and would travel to
Madrid on Aug. 14 to await word on whether he can compete in Seville.

"Apart from the death of my coach Jose Godoy, the positive test is the
worst thing that has ever happened to me," he said in a separate
interview in the French daily L'Equipe. "I have the impression that
the sky fell on me."