IOC chief Bach calls on sports bodies to clean up trheir act

Berlin (dpa) - International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach has called on sports governing bodies to clean up their act to restore credibility at the end of a year of scandal."When Olympic Agenda 2020 was adopted one year ago, my message to everyone in the Olympic Movement was: change or be changed," Bach said in his new year statement published on the IOC website."One just needs to look at the events over the last 12 months to realize that this message is even more urgent today to safeguard the credibility of sports organisations and to protect clean athletes."Undoubtedly, recent developments in some sports cast a shadow across the whole world of sport."World football governing body FIFA has been plagued by scandal and long-standing president Joseph Blatter has been banned from the game.The athletics body IAAF has been hit by allegations of bribery and cover-ups while Russian athletes have been suspended from competition due to their country operating a programme of systematic doping.