Russians in several sports have tested positive for a drug only added to the banned list by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) on January 1. 

Any positive drugs tests involving Russian weightlifters could have serious repercussions for their participation at this year's Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Russia is already poised to lose at least one of its quota places for Rio 2016 following four positive tests during the qualification period. 

At least eight Russians are known to have tested positive in the period.

Countries which register nine failures within a calendar year are automatically banned from the Games.

This has already happened to Bulgaria following 11 cases in 2015.

Romania has also forfeited a quota place.

Sergey Syrtsov, President of the Russian Weightlifting Federation, is confident that none of his athletes will test positive for meldonium.

"There were no registered cases of positive doping tests for meldonium among Russian weightlifting athletes as they were all already warned last year about the ban of meldonium," he told Russian news agency TASS.

Among the Russians under the threat of a ban after a positive test are Aleksei Lovchev, the over 105 kilogram world champion.

Two other winners from last year's World Championships in Houston are also currently facing the threat of bans.

Olga Zubova, winner of the women's clean and jerk gold and overall under 75kg bronze, and under 94kg competitor Aleksei Kosov, who lifted 181kg to claim the snatch gold medal, are currently appealing, it is believed.

Syrtsov, though, has dismissed fears Russia's place at Rio 2016 is in doubt.

"I see no obstacles at the moment and the ban is not a threat," he said.

"The Russian national team qualified for the maximum number of spots [at the Games] and is one of six countries having most of the licenses."