They were acting on advice from their own National Anti-Doping Organisation (ADOP), he said.

Pakistan faces a lengthy ban from the sport if charges laid against six athletes last week - two for testing positive and four for failing to provide samples - are proven.

Hafiz Imran Butt, the PWLF President, said there had been "a misunderstanding" between the head of ADOP and the leader of a testing team which had been sent unannounced by the International Testing Agency (ITA).

"The head of the team couldn’t satisfy the chairman of ADOP about his authority/identity," Butt said.

"The players were ready to give samples but on the direction of the ADOP chairman they didn’t give samples.

"Nobody was informed about the existence of a genuine representative of ITA in Lahore.

"That is why, perhaps, ADOP advised the players against giving samples."

The ITA, which carries out all anti-doping procedures for the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF), was acting on intelligence provided.

It targeted Pakistan and tested its team members on three occasions between November 10 and December 10 last year.

Two elite lifters, Talha Talib and Abubakar Ghani, tested positive for banned substances at the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) World Championships in Tashkent, Uzbekistan last December, the ITA said last week.

Talib had also been tested out-of-competition 12 days earlier and that sample came up positive too, the ITA said.

In Tashkent, Talib had become Pakistan’s first-ever medallist at the World Championships, taking a snatch bronze at 67 kilograms, four months after a fifth-place finish in the Olympic Games in Tokyo.

The ITA said it was acting on its own intelligence, and working jointly with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) when it sent its team to Lahore on November 10.

Four athletes, Muhammad Sharjeel Butt, Ghulam Mustafa, Abdur Rehman and Farhan Amjad, were charged under Article 2.3 of the IWF Anti-Doping Rules - "evading, refusing or failing to submit to sample collection".

Butt sent a statement to insidethegames saying, "On November 10, 2021, four or five persons came to a club 'Railway Stadium Weightlifting Academy' in Lahore and ordered the players to give samples for dope tests.

"Later it was revealed that they came on behalf of ITA.

"It has never happened before that dope tests have been taken without any information.

"ADOP, the national weightlifting federation and the National Olympic Committee of Pakistan had not been informed of the presence of ITA representatives in Lahore, so those lifters and coaches didn’t know either.

"They only knew that WADA, IWF and ADOP are responsible for doping tests.

"The players were confused and contacted their coach, and the coach then contacted one vice-president of PWLF, whose sons are lifters who had been asked to give the samples.

"Everyone was nervous and confused. 

"Then the VP/father of three lifters contacted the ADOP chairman and requested guidance in this situation.

"Then the chairman of ADOP talked on the phone with the head of the sample collection team.

"The head of the team couldn’t satisfy the chairman of ADOP about his authority/identity.

"He even did not show his Pakistan national ID Card.

"The chairman of ADOP, after talking to the concerned person, was not satisfied of his genuineness and advised the players’ father/VP not to give samples to this team."

Butt also said that "a parallel National Anti-Doping Agency" had been set up by the Government after it had been involved in a dispute with the National Olympic Committee "on different issues".

"So when this ITA team came it was assumed that it’s from the parallel NADO.

"The players were ready to give samples but due to the direction of the ADOP chairman they decided against it.

"This incident happened only due to a misunderstanding between the chairman of ADOP and the ITA doping team head [who] could not satisfy the chairman of ADOP that he was the true representative of ITA/WADA.

"All these facts have been provided to the ITA investigators by the players and also by the father of three players accused of refusing.

"I hope the command at ITA and the IWF executive board will decide in favour of the truth considering these facts that the players were not at fault at all."

insidethegames sent a further email to Butt, asking for more details on the positive samples provided by Ghani and Talib, but there was no reply.

A meeting of ITA and PWLF officials is due to be held tomorrow to discuss the situation, an unnamed PWLF official told local media.

He said, "There were two parallel anti-doping organisations working in Pakistan and the one owned by the Government told us through a letter that only they are responsible for collecting samples and not the other one working already.

"We will put all the relevant material in the May 1 virtual meeting with the international body."

Talib told a Pakistan newspaper that he had never knowingly taken steroids.

"I had no idea about the presence of prohibited substances in my body," claimed Talib, a bronze medallist at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games.

"I can never even think about violating doping rules.

"It could be an unintentional mistake, may be due to lack of knowledge, and for that I am sorry."

Talib, Ghani and Sharjeel Butt had all qualified for the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games starting on July 28 but cannot now compete as, like the other three charged, they have been provisionally suspended.

In the absence of gold-medal favourite Talib, the new top-ranked 67kg athlete is Jeremy Lalrinnunga of India.

Any nation with three or more doping violations within a year is liable to be suspended for up to four years and/or fined up to $500,000, depending on the perceived severity of the offences.