Fuentes' testimony expected this year

It is expected that Dr. Eufemiano Fuentes – at the centre of the Operación Puerto scandal – will be questioned this year in connection with the lawsuit between Jan Ullrich and German anti-doping crusader Werner Franke, according to Franke's attorney, Michael Lehner.

"Fuentes testimony will be in 2008," he told the dpa press agency. Currently the necessary documents are being translated into Spanish and will then be presented to the Spanish doctor. "Then we will see if Fuentes takes advantage of his right not to testify."

A court in Hamburg, Germany, has issued an injunction which prevents Franke from claiming that Ullrich paid Fuentes 35,000 euro. Franke has appealed that injunction, and the end of November the court ruled that testimony be taken from Fuentes on the matter. SW