MILAN — Andrea Baldini, a top foil fencer in the world, has been excluded from the Italian team for the Beijing Olympics after failing a doping test, the Italian Olympic Committee said Friday.
Baldini, 22, who won the silver medal in the foil at the 2006 and 2007 world championships, tested positive for the diuretic furosemide during the European fencing championship in Kiev last month, a spokesman said for the Italian panel, which is known as CONI.
The committee has given his place to Andrea Cassara, the European champion and bronze medalist at the Athens Olympics, who did not qualify because Baldini and Salvatore Sanzo ranked above him, the Italian Fencing Federation, or FIS, said on its Web site.
Earlier Friday, the federation president, Giorgio Scarso, had said Baldini could be restored for the Aug. 8-24 Games should a second sample prove negative.
"We heard last night that that was the result," Scarso said. "We have now asked for the counter-analysis," or B sample.
"I hope that the counter-analysis clears him - as they say, hope dies last.
"We're waiting for the result, even though the experts say it's 99 percent likely that the first result will be confirmed," Scarso added. "We're expecting the result early next week."
He said the medication was used in hospitals in cases of cardiac arrest, although it is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency because it can be used as a masking agent for other drugs.
The athlete told Scarso he was innocent in a telephone conversation, the president said.
He said he had taken an antibiotic but thought it was safe, Scarso added.
"I have spoken with Baldini," Scarso said, "and he told me he hasn't taken any" banned substances.
"The medic had prescribed an antibiotic, which does not contain this substance, is allowed and was declared at the time of the urine test," he added. "At this point, the boy says he doesn't know how to explain this result.
"I'm disconcerted, sad and it's an ugly thing for the world of fencing," Scarso said. "If he did something wrong he has to be punished. If, however, the analysis was wrong then he should be rehabilitated."
"It's a very strong signal to our athletes to be extremely cautious when using any kind of medicine, even if it's widely available in hospitals and pharmacies."
A federation doctor, Antonio Fiore, described Baldini's mood as "very frustrated and distressed" after also speaking to him on the telephone.
Italy has been hit by doping scandals in the run-up to the Games, with the announcement this week that the women's world road race cycling champion, Marta Bastianelli, had failed a drugs test followed by Riccardo Riccò's confession of taking EPO after testing positive in the Tour de France in July.
Thanou sees IOC 'unfairness'
Katerina Thanou, a doping-tainted Greek sprinter, is determined to run at the Beijing Olympics, saying Friday that lingering doubts about whether the International Olympic Committee will let her compete are unfair, The Associated Press reported from Athens.
Thanou, 33, served a two-year ban after missing a drug test before the 2004 Athens Olympics. She is on the Greek track team for the Beijing Games after qualifying in the 100 meters.
An IOC disciplinary committee is due to meet Thursday - the eve of the opening ceremony - to decide whether she can participate.
"There is no official charge against me, so why am I being asked if I want to take part in the Olympics even though I have qualified under the rules?" Thanou said at a news conference, speaking publicly for the first time since 2004.
The 2004 doping scandal involving Thanou and a fellow Greek sprinter, Costas Kenteris, was a major embarrassment for the organizers of the Athens Games. The two sprinters claimed they had been involved in a motorcycle accident after missing a doping test.