Meeting Between Coe and Diack Cancelled

(ATR) A private meeting between IAAF President Sebastian Coe and his disgraced predecessor Lamine Diack, scheduled for Friday in Paris, has been cancelled.

The IAAF, in a statement to Around the Rings on Wednesday, said it "understands the meeting has been cancelled by the former president for medical reasons and we are currently awaiting written confirmation".

Diack is under trial for an array of accusations involving vote buying to secure IAAF World Championships as well as Olympic Games. He is also implicated in a scheme to blackmail Russian track and field athletes, extorting bribes to conceal positive drug tests.

Diack, who stepped down from the IAAF in 2015 with the election of Coe, has been under investigation since 2016, prohibited from traveling from France to his home in Senegal.

Diack has the right to ask for Coe to appear to testify, ATR has been told by a member of the French prosecution team.

But Coe also has the right to refuse. ATR understands that the IAAF chief agreed to the meeting with Diack to help move the inquiry forward.

ATR is told that the encounter between Coe and Diack was to be one of the last steps in the inquiry. It is not known if Diack will file another request for the meeting.

If it is not rescheduled, the case will go to the judge for a ruling. ATR is told by the prosecution that this could take as long as a year.

The case against Diack also includes his son, Papa Masata. He is accused as the one who made arrangements for payoffs to his father. While his father is stranded in France, Papa Masata is holed up in Senegal, refusing requests by French prosecutors to testify in Paris. He has denied wrongdoing.

The inquiry has spread to Brazil where a trial is underway alleging that the Diacks were involved with purchasing the votes of IOC members in 2009 when Rio bid for the 2016 Olympics.

The Diacks are also linked to suspicions of vote buying for the 2018 Winter Olympic bid from PyeongChang and the 2020 campaign of Tokyo for the Summer Olympics.

Written and reported by Ed Hula and Gerard Farek

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