RF Accounting Chamber claims violations in preparation for Olympics in Vancouver and their impact on Sochi Games

The RF Accounting Chamber has published a report on checking the use of resources on preparing for the XXI Olympic Games in Vancouver, which notes non-targeted use by the Ministry of Sport and Tourism of resources for Olympic Games in Canada, and also problems in preparing for the Sochi Olympics.

According to the auditors, in winter 2010, the Ministry of Sport and Tourism spent too much for the travel and stay expenses of the Olympic delegation in Vancouver. Some Russian national teams, apart from sportsmen, included as official members doctors, masseurs and "persons having no appropriate duties", runs the report. The amount of per diems paid to the members of the official Olympic delegation, who were not sportsmen, came up to $101,100, reports the newspaper "Vedomosti".

The AC has established that the CJSC "Olympic Panorama", the RF official ticket agent, resold 40% of tickets within the Russian quota to the Cyprus company Hambsello Commercial Limited at a minimum surcharge, while the surcharge for Russian buyers was up to 11 times higher than the threshold.

The Accounting Chamber is also dissatisfied with the overall situation with the training of sportsmen and infrastructure development.

The conclusion bears a global character: the system of preparing sportsmen and events is "ineffective, imperfect and every year serves as a source of income for certain persons and organizations, bears in itself a corruption element and, on the whole, requires radical changes".

The Accounting Chamber experts claim that the failure of the Russian national team in Vancouver may indirectly impact the results of Sochi Olympic Games in 2014, writes the "Novaya Gazeta".

Vladimir Semago, member of the expert council under the Accounting Chamber chairman, while commenting on the AC audit results, notes that, at present, the Accounting Chamber closely monitors the preparations for the Sochi Olympics.

Vitali Mutko, RF Minister of Sport, Tourism and Youth Policy, assesses the efforts of the auditors as "hunting bugs". "I do not know who and what writes this, these are all speculations", states Mutko to the "Interfax". In particular, he refutes the accusation of wrong allocation of resources in providing hotel rooms to members of the Russian delegation during the Olympics in Vancouver.