All players to be dope tested before 2009 World Classic

HAVANA (Reuters) - All players at the 2009 World Baseball Classic will be tested for performance-enhancing drugs ahead of the March tournament, international baseball's top official said on Wednesday.

The tests will start 45 days before the classic begins, International Baseball Federation (IBAF) President Harvey Schiller told a news conference.

"Every player will be tested," he said.

Schiller said the program is part of a general crackdown on performance-enhancing drugs that the IBAF and other sports organizations have undertaken.

"All sports federations are concerned with the issue of doping," he told reporters in Havana.

The World Anti-Doping Agency complained in 2006 that it was unable to perform unannounced drug tests before the first World Baseball Classic and it was unclear whether the IBAF had complied with the agency's testing code.

One player, a South Korean pitcher, was removed from the 2006 Classic after testing positive for a banned drug. U.S. pitcher Roger Clemens, seven-time Cy Young Award winner for best pitcher, refused to take a drug test.

He has since been accused of using steroids in a report prepared for Major League Baseball by former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell. Clemens has denied the accusations.

Schiller said he was in Havana to talk with Cuban sports officials about ways of getting baseball reinstated as an Olympic sport. The International Olympic Committee voted to drop it after the Beijing Olympics in August.

Olympic officials have said they want baseball officials to toughen rules against doping.

Schiller said Cuba, whose team finished second to Japan in the 2006 classic and where baseball is widely popular, will help in the campaign to bring baseball back to the Olympics in 2016.

Part of the effort will be spreading the popularity of the game to countries where it is little known, he said.

(Editing by Jeff Franks and Alan Baldwin)