China Olympics - Stick to decision!! Thanou will not appeal IOC decision???

China Olympics - Stick to decision!! Thanou will not appeal IOC decision???

Katerina Thanou attacked the "totalitarian" International Olympic Committee on Sunday after the Greek sprinter was banned from the Beijing Games.

Thanou issued a statement harshly criticizing a "prearranged mockery of a decision."

"Since they have not succeeded in breaking my spirit ...the masks fell and we came to this arbitrary and illegal decision that tramples on any notion of justice and equity," Thanou said. "It is these totalitarian practices and decisions that bring the sporting spirit and the Olympic ideal that my country gave birth to into disrepute."

Thanou said she will continue competing.

Earlier, a lawyer for Thanou said she will not appeal the decision but was likely to seek compensation for not being allowed to take part.

"We will go to court as soon as possible," Nikos Kollias told The Associated Press, without elaborating.

Kollias also accused the IOC of timing its decision to prevent Thanou from lodging an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

"The way the whole thing was manipulated, there is no time. We would have to seek an injunction against the events taking place and Katerina certainly did not want that," Kollias said.

The IOC said that Thanou's role in a drug-testing cover-up four years ago in Athens had brought the Olympic movement into disrepute.

Thanou and fellow Greek sprinter Kostas Kenteris missed doping tests on the eve of the 2004 opening ceremony, and claimed later they were injured in a motorcycle accident. Both eventually withdrew from the games and were banned by the IAAF, the governing body for world track and field.

China Olympics - Stick to decision!! Thanou will not appeal IOC decision???