LAUSANNE, Jan. 23 (Xinhua) -- The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has decided that the Belarus canoe and kayak team should not have been given the one-year ban which kept them out of last year's Rio Olympics.

The International Canoe Federation (ICF) imposed a one-year ban in July last year on the Belarus senior men's canoe and kayak team, keeping them out of all international competitions including the 2016 Olympic Games due to alleged multiple anti-doping rule violations.

The CAS announced on Tuesday that Belarus' appeal was upheld.

"The CAS Panel found that there was insufficient evidence to uphold several of the alleged anti-doping rule violations," it said in a statement. "Accordingly, in the absence of multiple anti-doping rule violations, the panel found that there was no justification to uphold the imposition of a one-year ban," the statement continued.