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Nadia Comanici has joined in the growing support for teenage gymnast Andreea Raducan who was stripped of her Olympic gold medal for taking a cold remedy.
Comanici who won three golds for Romania at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, said it was unfair to take away the 17-year-olds individual gold medal after she tested positive for the banned drug pseudoephedrine contained in a cold remedy issued by the team doctor.
Despite admitting these were "the Olympics of zero tolerance" for doping, she added: "It's unfair to tell her: 'your innocent but we're not going to give you the medal'."
Raducan lost her fight to be reinstated as the all-around champion on Thursday after the Court of Arbitration for Sport said it had dismissed her appeal and ruled the IOC was right to disqualify her "as a matter of law and in fairness to all other athletes".
On the eve of the decision hundreds of young Romanians gathered on the streets to vent their frustration and anger at the IOC's decision.
"The IOC has killed the Olympic spirit," a teenager in Raducan's
hometown of Birlad said.
After the announcemnt a local private television station showed pictures of dozens of children in a school yard in the Black Sea port of Constanta chanting in support of Raducan.
"We don't care about the IOC," the children said.
Andreea is the champion and she will be the champion forever." Local media called the IOC's decision cynical and unfair.
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