Story highlights
- Former head of Russia's anti-doping agency dies aged 52
- Nikita Kamaev died of a "massive heart attack"
- Russia has been banned from athletics over a huge doping scandal
(CNN)The former head of Russia's anti-doping agency RUSADA has died less than two months after resigning from his post.
Nikita Kamaev suffered a "massive heart attack," according to a statement on the organization's official website.
The 52-year-old stepped down in December following a doping scandal that saw Russia banned from international athletics.
IAAF president on Russia's future in athletics 02:05
"Nikita will stay in our memory as an experienced and knowledgeable manager, highly professional, a manager who created a friendly atmosphere within the company," the RUSADA statement read.
"RUSADA expresses condolences to the family, dear ones and colleagues over the premature death of Nikita Kamaev."
Report: Ban Russia from athletics for doping 01:32
RUSADA's former director general Ramil Khabriev was quoted as telling Russia's TASS news agency that Kamaev had "complained of heartache after a skiing session."
"He had never complained about heart problems, at least to me," added Khabriev. "Maybe his wife knew about such problems."
In November, a report by former World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) chief Dick Pound released accused Russia of running a state-sponsored doping program.
It said there was a deeply rooted culture of cheating at all levels within Russian athletics and that over 1,400 samples had been "intentionally or maliciously" destroyed by a Moscow laboratory.
The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) responded by banning Russia from competition. Speaking to CNN Sport last month IAAF president Seb Coe said there was no timetable for its return.
"It will be when we are satisfied that the changes have been made are both verifiable and sustainable," he said. "This cannot be just a one-off change, we have to be sure that these changes are culturally embedded in the sport going forward."
Kamaev and a clutch of other top officials quit as Russia began the reform process it hopes will see it allowed it athletes to participate in the Rio Olympics.
Photos: Battling drug cheats
The World Anti-Doping Agency's (WADA) new report is the latest twist to hit the Russian doping scandal, building on Professor Richard Mclaren's initial findings, published in July, which concluded doping was widespread among Russian athletes.
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Photos: Battling drug cheats
More than 1,000 Russian athletes across 30 sports -- including football -- benefited from state-sponsored doping, according to the latest report.
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The doping program, across summer, winter and Paralympic sports, was in operation from 2011 to 2015, said Mr McLaren, who presented his latest findings at a news conference in London Friday.
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WADA's initial report on alleged widespread drug use in international athletics concluded that senior figures including IAAF president Sebastian Coe (pictured) "could not have been unaware of the extent of doping."
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Former WADA president Dick Pound chaired a press conference held in Munich on January 14, 2016 to present the 89-page report. It said "corruption was embedded" and "cannot be blamed on a small number of miscreants" within the IAAF.
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A report by the IAAF's ethics committee claims a powerful trio blackmailed Russian distance runner Lilya Shobukhova into paying them off to keep results of her positive drug tests secret.
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Russia's former athletics president Valentin Balakhnichev, its ex-chief coach for long-distance athletes Alexei Melnikov and former IAAF consultant Papa Massata Diack have all been banned for life. The report said "far from supporting the anti-doping regime, they subverted it." The IAAF's former anti-doping director Gabriel Dollé has been given a five-year ban.
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The report claims Balakhnichev, Melnikov and Papa Massata Diack "conspired together ... to conceal for more than three years anti-doping violations by an athlete at what appeared to be the highest pinnacle of her sport. All three compounded the vice of what they did by conspiring to extort what were in substance bribes from Shobukhova by acts of blackmail."
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Pound produced an independent report in November 2015 which detailed systemic doping in Russia along with an establishment effort to cover it up. He recommended Russia be banned from athletic competition, which it duly was by the IAAF.
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The findings uncovered a "deeply-rooted culture of cheating at all levels" within Russian athletics. Asked if it amounted to state-sponsored doping, Pound told reporters: "In the sense of consenting to it, there's no other conclusion."
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The report suggested the London 2012 Olympics -- in which Russia won 24 gold medals and finished fourth -- was "in a sense, sabotaged by the admission of athletes who should have not been competing."
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Pound's report detailed "corruption and bribery practices at the highest levels of international athletics," evidence of which has been given to international crime-fighting organization Interpol for further investigation.
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Senegal's Lamine Diack, former president of the IAAF, is being investigated by French police over claims he accepted bribes to defer sanctions against drug cheats from Russia. French prosecutors claim he took "more than €1 million ($1M)" for his silence. Diack has yet to comment.
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Coe, a former Olympic gold medalist, has come under fire for his praise for predecessor Diack, whom he called the sport's "spiritual leader" when he took over the role in August 2015. He told CNN he would "do anything to fix our sport."
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