"We won and the IAAF lost," said Walker's lawyer, Nick Bitel.

We won and the IAAF lost

Nick Bitel, Walker's lawyer

"We believe that the IAAF rules stipulate that their case is against UK Athletics, not Dougie Walker.

"If UK Athletics got it wrong, then the IAAF should take sanctions against them. The rules do not allow them to drag Dougie back into it."

Olympic

The news came as the Australian Sports Drug Agency announced it is to investigate claims by a former Olympic athlete that high-ranking Australian Olympic officials had secretly encouraged widespread drug use among athletes.

Discus-thrower Werner Reiterer, a finalist at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, has alleged that officials were complicit in a tailored schedule of testing which allowed suspect athletes to avoid doping tests.

Walker in 200m action

Reiterer, who admitted to spending about AUS$20,000 each year since 1995 on human growth hormones and steroids, said his coach was unaware of his drug-taking but athletics officials knew of it.

Australian Sports Drug Agency chief executive Natalie Howson said there was no evidence to suggest the agency's work, "is anything but scrupulous."

"As an independent government agency, we take all such allegations seriously," she said.

"Our systems are set up against international standards that are designed to minimize athletes avoiding testing."

Reiterer, the 1994 Commonwealth Games gold medallist, retired before the 1996 Atlanta Olympics but made a comeback in 1997.

He claimed that he had been subtly encouraged to take drugs, adding that he was given advice from "an Olympic administrator" about pending doping tests and about what levels of certain substances were acceptable in the testing.