KARACHI, Dec 16: Pakistan has insisted the case of fast bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif being exonerated of a doping offence is closed after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said it would take the matter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

Chairman WADA Dick Pound said in an interview with the BBC that his organisation would challenge Pakistan's decision to lift long-term bans on Shoaib and Asif. “We have no comment on this. As far as the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) is concerned the matter is closed,” the PCB Chairman Nasim Ashraf told reporters on Saturday. “I have already communicated to the authorities concerned that all doping policies of the International Cricket Council (ICC) member countries should be WADA compliant,” Nasim added.

Shoaib and Asif were exonerated by a PCB appeals tribunal last week after they were earlier banned for two years and one year respectively for testing positive for the banned steroid nandrolone by an inquiry panel.

Pound said WADA would contest the decision on the basis that the ICC is signed up to the anti-doping code and Pakistan, as one of its full members, should therefore be subject to its provisions. “The two players tested positive. They have not even asked for the B samples to be analysed, so they accept the result (of the initial tests) and the PCB simply did not apply the code,” Pound said.

Nasim said he did not want to give premature statements on the WADA challenge. “But when and if the time and situation come we will deal with it accordingly,” he expressed. “Shoaib and Asif, as far as we re concerned if they are fit and make themselves available for selection, are candidates for the South Africa tour and the World Cup,” he added.

Another senior PCB official said the board was expecting some eaction from WADA. “We are satisfied with the way this case has been handled but we are prepared for any challenge from WADA in any court,” he said. “We have already consulted our team of legal experts and if the need arises we can also hire experts on doping policies to contest our case.”

Pound also criticised the ICC for failing to take decisive action over the matter and said WADA would exercise its responsibility in the case. “If we are successful in this, I think it will be a matter of considerable embarrassment to the ICC that it did not act,” Pound said.

Nasim said this week that the issue was an internal matter for Pakistan and WADA regulations did not apply to it.

In response, Pound said: “Our job is to monitor compliance with the world anti-doping code which prohibits the substances the two cricketers took. In cases of that nature, there are sanctions that are meant to be applied and in our view they have been improperly applied,” Pound stated.

“You cannot have in an anti-doping system an individual national federation purporting to act without regard to the rules of the international federation which has adopted the code,” he said. —Reuters