In a statement, the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) confirmed it had launched criminal proceedings in relation to the attempted hacking of WADA's Lausanne office.

The proceedings were started in March 2017, the OAG added, and are being conducted "on suspicion of political espionage".

According to Swiss officials, the same two Russians were detained in The Netherlands earlier this year after they were implicated in a planned attack on the Bern Laboratory, which was investigating the poisoning of Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in Salisbury in Britain.

They were detained in the Hague earlier this year and extradited back to Russia following a joint-intelligence operation carried out by authorities in Britain, Switzerland and The Netherlands.

A separate statement from the Federal Intelligence Service (FIS) said it was "aware of the case of Russian spies discovered in The Hague and expelled from the same place" and that the body "participated actively in this operation together with its Dutch and British partners".

A spokesperson for the OAG said the individuals suspected of a cyber-attack on WADA "are those affected by the operation mentioned by the FIS".

"The aforementioned criminal proceedings in a different context refer to criminal proceedings being conducted by the OAG due to a cyber-attack against WADA," the spokesperson added.

The announcement from the OAG just a day after WADA announced its Compliance Review Committee (CRC) had recommended the Russian Anti-Doping Agency (RUSADA) be reinstated at a meeting of its Executive Committee in the Seychelles next week.

WADA said the CRC was satisfied the two remaining conditions on RUSADA's roadmap to recompliance had been met.

The decision has since been heavily criticised as it provided confirmation that WADA made compromises on the initial criteria.

Russia sent a letter to WADA accepting the Schmid Commission report - a softening of the original requirement to publicly accept the McLaren Report - while they also offered a "commitment"  to provide data and access to the samples stored at the Moscow Laboratory via an independent expert.

In response to the OAG, the Russian embassy dismissed the allegations as an attempt to affect the decision of the Executive Committee concerning RUSADA.

WADA confirmed an attack from Russian hacking group Fancy Bears in September 2016, which led to the publication of several athletes' confidential medical data.

WADA declined to comment when contacted by insidethegames.