Drugs: Star Romanian gymnast stripped of gold in doping bombshell

Romania's Olympic gymnastics gold medallist Andreea Raducan has tested positive for a banned drug and has been stripped of her women's all-round title in the latest doping bombshell to hit the Sydney Games.

The news threatened to overshadow Aboriginal athlete Cathy Freeman's victory in the women's 400 metres to an ecstatic roar from the home crowd - underlining her new-found status as a symbol of reconciliation between Australia's native Aborigines and its European settlers.

International Olympic Committee officials and Romanian sports chiefs met into the early hours of Tuesday morning before finally emerging to tell reporters that Raducan had tested positive for a drug banned by the IOC.

IOC medical chief Prince Alexandre De Merode said the Olympic body's medical commission proposed that the 16-year-old be stripped of her women's all-round gold medal but be allowed to keep a team gold and a silver.

With her dark eyes, hair pulled back in a ponytail and playful smile, Raducan has charmed the crowds in Sydney with her joyful energy and seemingly effortless skill.

Raducan, the first Romanian to claim the all-round title since the great Nadia Comaneci in 1976, was ushered to a waiting car while officials broke the news she had tested positive over the drug pseudo-ephedrine.

The team doctor who gave Raducan the drug in two cold medicine pills was expelled from the games and suspended through until 2004.

Romanian Olympic Committee president Ioan Tiriac said the substance was in Neurofen, an over-the-counter medicine, that Raducan had taken to treat a cold.

De Merode confirmed the positive doping test, saying: ``We consider it was not a voluntary action.''

Raducan, who will be 17 on Saturday, has won the women's artistic all-round title as well as the team gold and the silver in the vault at the Sydney Games.

Tiriac said Raducan was shattered by the news.

He said he had taken Neurofen ``in probably 10 times more doses'' than Raducan had.

``These Neurofen, probably at her size and her weight, made this positive test,'' he said.

Tiriac said the medicine was not performance enhancing and was taken solely as a cold remedy.

``We are talking about two cold pills that you buy over the counter,'' he said. ``We believe that this case is completely irrelevant, the athlete is the best gymnast in the world.

The Olympics have been repeatedly scarred by drugs since 1988 when Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson tested positive for steroids after winning the 100 metres in Seoul. Ever since, a drug scandal has been the constant nightmare of Games officials.

The Raducan case and some sensational allegations against US athletics took some gloss off a superlative night of track and field at the Sydney Games.

The International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) said on Monday that world shot champion C J Hunter, husband of 100 metres gold medallist Marion Jones, had tested positive for the banned anabolic steroid nandrolone.

Hunter, 31, pulled out of the Olympics before the start of the Games, citing a knee injury.

Perhaps even more damaging, de Merode told reporters that five American athletes had competed at the Seoul Olympics despite failing dope tests beforehand.

He said American officials had never passed on the results to the IOC. Asked if he felt a cover-up had taken place, he said: ``Yes, certainly.''

The IAAF's top anti-doping official, Arne Ljungqvist, alleged last week that US athletics chiefs had failed to explain 15 suspicious drug tests among their athletes in the past two years.

Hunter later issued a statement through American broadcaster NBC saying: ``I know what's going on and I am aware of the allegations and am going to defend myself vigorously.''

There was more confusion over the stance towards doping in the worst affected sport, weightlifting - the subject of a series of roller-coaster rulings during the Sydney Olympics.

On Monday the sporting world's top court ruled that Bulgarian weightlifter Alan Tzagaev could take part in Sydney and that a ban on Bulgaria's whole weightlifting team lacked a legal basis.

- REUTERS