FACTBOX: Who is Juan Antonio Samaranch?

(Reuters) - Juan Antonio Samaranch, 87, has been strongly criticized by outgoing World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) chief Dick Pound for his stance on doping while in charge of the International Olympic Committee.

Here are some details about Samaranch.

* EARLY LIFE:

-- Born in Barcelona on July 17, 1920, Samaranch pursued a career in sports politics in former dictator General Francisco Franco's fascist Spain.

-- He was Spanish chef de mission at three Olympic Games before winning a place on the International Olympic Committee in 1966.

-- After Franco's death, Samaranch was appointed as ambassador to the Soviet Union where important contacts among third world sports officials helped him succeed Lord Killanin as IOC president in 1980.

* PRESIDENT OF THE IOC:

-- At the start of his presidency, he steered the Olympic movement through two successive political boycotts, a U.S.-led western boycott of the 1980 Moscow Olympics followed by an eastern bloc retaliation in 1984 at Los Angeles, both of which could have destroyed the Games.

-- The Los Angeles Games however were a financial success and represented a clear break with the past, with its focal sport of athletics now fully professional.