The Spanish judge presiding over the case has dropped the charge accusing the two-time European 5,000 metres champion of providing a fellow athlete with a banned performance-enhancing substance.

The public prosecutor's office has five days to appeal, but court spokesman Jose Manuel Garcia told the Associated Press it was unlikely to do so.

Dominguez still faces charges of tax evasion and administering medications without a licence.

Dominguez was among 14 people detained in December's "Operation Galgo," investigation into doping in Spanish athletics.

The file in the case runs to 5,000 pages and it includes wiretaps, bank transfer records, photographs and surveillance records.

The judge also threw out the case for alleged doping against Dominguez's manager, Jose Alonso Valero.

Dominguez, who won 3,000m steeplechase gold in Berlin in 2009 after taking silver in the 5,000m in 2003 and 2001, has always denied the allegations against her.

Dominguez had been suspended as one of the four vice-presidents of Spain's athletics federation while the investigation was underway.

She has already said that she would not defend her world title in the 2011 event in Daegu because she is currently pregnant but had planned to return the following year to compete in the London Olympics.

Alemayehu Bezabeh, the 2009 European cross country champion, has also been cleared after being implicated in the invetigation. 

The Ethiopian-born runner was allegedly caught carrying a bag of his own blood for a blood transfusion.

Bezabeh admitted that half a litre of his blood had been taken but insisted it was for testing purposes.

According to reports, the Spanish federation decided to clear Bezabeh because of lack of evidence and given that the country's "sporting legislation does not consider a simple attempt at doping as a misdemeanour".


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