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American Morning

International Skating Union to Investigate What's Being Called Questionable Scoring in Pairs Figure Skating Final

Aired February 13, 2002 - 08:06   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: We've got to move on to that Olympic controversy now. Up front this morning, judging the Olympic judges, the International Skating Union says it will now investigate what is being called questionable scoring in the Pairs Figure Skating Final on Monday night.

Now, this incidence has sparked the first controversy in this year's Olympics. We are going to take a closer look at the gold medal investigation with two former U.S. Olympic skaters, but first, let's get an Olympics update right now from our own Carol Lin live in Salt Lake City, who did some very enterprising reporting for us yesterday on this story -- good morning, Carol. Anything new?

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning, Paula. Yes, as you said, the official inquiry will go forward. We are expecting to hear from the International Skating Union later today.

The Canadians had demanded that this inquiry go forward, and we spoke with Mark Lund, the publisher of "International Skating" magazine, and he made a bold prediction of what the ISU should find.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK LUND, PUBLISHER, "INTERNATIONAL FIGURE SKATING" MAGAZINE: All of the Eastern Bloc countries always play a very big factor, especially in pairs and in ice dancing. What I think this splitting (ph) judge was the French judge, and I think it was one of these things where we'll give you pairs for gold from Russia, but you give us our French ice dances for gold later on this week.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LIN: So we have to see what happens in that competition. But, Paula, it is all the talk here as to what happened with the Canadians and the Russians, and whether in fact there was collusion behind the scenes.

ZAHN: All right. Describe to us what's going to happen in this investigation, so we have a much better understanding of who actually controls these judges.

LIN: Well, Paula, the fact of the matter is who controls the judges are the individual countries. In other words, the Russians police the Russian judge. That is the international rules, so even if the International Skating Union decides that there was some form of collusion, it is going to be up to the individual judges -- or rather the countries to sanction their judges.

So it's a bit of the fox watching the hen house. Frankly, nothing is expected to happen or to come out of this inquiry. Nothing is going to change the fact that the Russians got the gold and the Canadians got the silver.

ZAHN: But what it certainly does is make people question the credibility of any of these scores that these judges arrive at. And I am sorry, what Mark Lund just said is pretty darn explosive, an accusation that a French judge actually traded a gold medal in pairs for a different medal in ice dancing.

LIN: Exactly. And what Mark told us is that these deals are cut all the time. That this is a matter of routine, but it doesn't become public, because the world of figure skating is a secret one, Paula. And what he is saying is he is hoping that this inquiry and the public demand for answers is going to bring out a lot of the ugly truth of what happens behind the scenes.

ZAHN: All right, Carol Lin, thanks for that update.

LIN: Sure.

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