The International Olympic Committee (IOC) medical chief Arne Ljungqvist said on Tuesday that he suspected the seven Russian athletes suspended of systematic doping.

Ljungqvist, also vice president of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), said he was disappointed by these kind of behavior but in favor of the IAAF's firm stance toward doping.

"Yes, I agree that it is very much like a case of systematic doping. This would fall under the new WADA code that carries a four-year ban," he said at the press briefing following the first day's meeting of the 120th IOC session here ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

"I think such type of cheating still going on is disappointing. The procedure is still going on and it is for the Russian Federation to find out what was going on," he said.

But he congratulated the IAAF on "doing a good job in revealing a very bad doping story".

The IAAF provisionally suspended seven top Russian female athletes with five of them already qualified for the Beijing Games.

They were suspected of switching urine samples in drug tests when the IAAF said discrepancies in their DNA results indicated the samples given were not from the athletes in question.

Yelena Soboleva, fastest in 800 meters and 1500 meters this year in the world, middle distance runners Svetlana Cherkasova, Yulia Fomenko, Tatyana Tomashova, Olga Yegorova, hammer thrower Gulfiya Khanafeyeva, and reigning European discus champion Darya Pishchalnikova were named.

(Xinhua News Agency August 6, 2008)