The 36-year-old is the son of Sergey Litvinov, the 1988 Olympic gold medallist, world and former world record holder.

He blamed the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) for pressurising him to take banned drugs.

Following his admission, the Russian Anti-Doping Agency announced that they had imposed a two-year ban on Litvinov starting from November 8 in 2021 until November 7 this year.

They had also disqualified all his results between July 14 2012 and February 25 2016.

The Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) confirmed the suspension and the annulment of Litvinov's results for this period.

Litvinov made the admission that he took anabolic steroids on his Facebook page, Russia’s official state news agency TASS reported.

"In 2012, from the end of April to the end of May, I took turinabol and oxandrolone," he wrote.

"Before using them, I threw 79 metres, doping helped me improve my results by 2 metres.

"The hammer flew on without a good feeling or good technique.

"Then I felt that it was wrong.

"I lost all my technical sensations with which I used to work so hard, and the hammer was still flying far.

"I didn’t make the Olympic team in 2012 because I made three free attempts on the qualifying day of the Russian Championship.

"After that, I didn’t drink anything because I realised that this was not the sport that I liked.

"My motivation was to get better and to improve in a very difficult technical competition.

"I was interested in the methods of training, technique and psychology of this sport.

"To improve without improvement in these things, but with doping, does not make any sense."

Litvinov alleged that RusAF had encouraged him to use drugs.

"But in the end it was my decision and my fault," he wrote.

"When the Russian doping scandal started, I tried my best to improve the situation in my country, created an anti-doping community and helped investigators like Hajo Seppelt [the German journalist who did several doping investigative in Russian sports].

"In the end, I did not confess my sins.

"Over the past months, I have referred all the details of my case to the AIU.

"I want to apologise to the track and field athletics community."

Litvinov started his career competing for Belarus before switching to Germany, finishing fifth in the 2009 World Championships in Berlin.

Litvinov, born in Rostov-on-Don, started representing his native Russia in 2011.

Litvinov won a bronze medal in the 2013 Summer Universiade in Kazan and at the following year’s European Championships in Zurich.

He is now expected to lose both medals.

If confirmed, Belarus’ Yury Shayunou will be promoted from fourth to third at Kazan 2013.

Another Belarusian, Pavel Kryvitski, would move up to bronze in the European Championships.

Kryvitski himself tested positive for growth hormones in 2015 and was subsequently given a four-year ban from sport.

Litvinov’s last international appearance came at the 2017 World Championships in London when, competing under a neutral flag due to Russia’s ban for state-sponsored doping imposed in November 2015, he failed to qualify for the final.

His father, Sergey Litvinov, the 1983 and 1987 world champion, died in February 2018 at the age of 60.