Moroccan athlete tested positive at Cork event

THE IAAF are trying to trace a Moroccan athlete who tested positive for a banned substance at Cork City Sports last July.

Meryem Karouani Boucetta is one of two Moroccan athletes who tested positive and cannot be located to have their cases resolved. Rabia Elatiallah tested positive after the Marathon d’Eure in Chartres last May but she too is on the IAAF’s missing list.

Boucetta was one of the stars in action at the Mardyke last July when she was a runaway winner of the women’s 3,000m, sprinting clear of the Russian, Julia Chijenko, to win in 9:99.16.

She was tested then, but when the results were announced she was nowhere to be found.

Boucetta, who was based in Germany this year, was on her second visit to Cork. Last year she ran in the 1,500m. Both Boucetta and Elatiallah stand suspended pending a resolution of their cases.

Another Moroccan has been included in the most recent list of positive dope cases sanctioned definitively.

Asmae Leghzaoui was positive at the world cross-country championships in Lausanne last March and has been banned for two years. The fact that Boucetta tested positive in Cork came as news to the City Sports organisers.

“We would not be informed as to the results of the tests,” chairman Dick Hodgins said. “Testing has been carried out at the meet for at least 20 years and, as an EAA permit meeting, we have to make facilities for testing available.

"The testing is carried out under the auspices of the Irish Sports Council and the samples are sent to London. We get a list of the people who were tested, but we would not get the results of the tests.”