Journalist Paul Kimmage launches UCI legal action

Published on 02/11/2012 01:11

Irish journalist Paul Kimmage has lodged a criminal complaint against International Cycling Union (UCI) president Pat McQuaid and honorary president Hein Verbruggen in a move which will subject the leadership of the world governing body to further scrutiny.

The UCI, McQuaid and Verbruggen last week announced they were suspending defamation proceedings against former Sunday Times journalist Kimmage pending the results of an independent report.

Now ex-rider Kimmage, who has been hugely critical of the UCI leadership’s response to doping in cycling, has launched proceedings of his own as the impact of the Lance Armstrong affair shows no sign of abating. Kimmage wrote on Twitter: “I have lodged a criminal complaint against Hein Verbruggen and Pat McQuaid.

“I have initiated these proceedings not for myself – this is not about Paul Kimmage, but on behalf of the whistleblowers – Stephen Swart, Frankie Andreu, Floyd Landis, Christophe Bassons, Nicolas Aubier, Gilles Delion, Graeme Obree and every other cyclist who stood up for truth and the sport they loved and were dismissed as ‘cowards’ and ‘scumbags’ by Verbruggen and McQuaid.”

Meanwhile, a former board member, says the UCI should pay for the independent investigation into allegations it covered up doping by Armstrong. Last week McQuaid announced a commission to examine allegations about the governing body’s conduct raised by the US Anti-Doping Agency report into Armstrong, including that he donated $125,000 in exchange for covering up suspicious tests.

Sylvia Schenk, an adviser to anti-corruption body Transparency International and a UCI member for five years up to 2005, said: “If the UCI discloses everything then it really has a chance to look into details to see who has been involved, and to take measures to kick out those who have been involved. “Whether it will really happen depends whether such a commission is really independent and having resources.”