An audit of the IBU's anti-doping programme has begun ©IBU

An external audit of the International Biathlon Union's (IBU) anti-doping programmes has been launched in a bid to show how the organisation has reformed.

The audit, which is being overseen by the Institute of Anti-Doping Organisations (iNADO), is one criteria which the world governing body must fulfill if they are to have their funding restored by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

iNADO representative Matthias Kamber was welcomed to the IBU headquarters in Salzburg to begin the evaluation by the body's acting secretary general Martin Kuchenmeister.

iNADO is an umbrella group of National Anti-Doping Organisations which repeatedly clashed with the IOC and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) amid the Russian doping scandal.

Their report will be presented to the IBU prior to their Congress in the Croatian city of Poreč in September.

It followed the opening of probes across Europe earlier this year into possible doping, fraud and corruption involving Russian athletes and the raiding of the IBU's Salzburg headquarters based on a tip-off by WADA.

Former President Anders Besseberg and former secretary general Nicole Resch are suspected of accepting bribes amounting to $300,000 (£211,000/€243,000) and other benefits in return for a favourable stance towards Russia - but deny wrongdoing.

The IBU have shown growing willingness to combat doping problems since the allegations emerged, however, and are currently the only winter International Federation to have prosecuted a Russian athlete - Ekaterina Glazyrina - based on evidence commissioned or obtained by WADA.

It is not clear if other winter federations would be prepared to undergo similar audits.