The AIU said in a statement on its website it had suspended Chepkirui, the Glasgow 2014 gold medallist, for use of a prohibited substance/method in a case concerning her Athlete Biological Passport (ABP).

The Unit, which was founded by the International Association of Athletics Federations to combat doping in the sport, said it had also suspended Jacob Kibet Chulyo Kendagor, who in 2017 finished second at the Hamburg and Istanbul Marathons and was fifth in the Turkish city last year.

Kendagor was reprimanded for "evading, refusing or failing to submit to sample collection".

Chepkirui's best season on the track came in 2014, when she was also crowned the 10,000m African champion.

She then focused on road races, winning the 2015 Amsterdam Marathon before placing third at the Boston Marathon and fourth at the New York City Marathon in 2016.

The suspensions are the latest blow to Kenyan athletics, with seven athletes from the country now serving provisional suspensions.

Last month, Salome Jerono Biwott was charged with an alleged doping offence by the AIU.

She is facing a second doping ban of her career after testing positive for the banned substance norandrosterone.

Among the other Kenyans suspended for anti-doping violations are World Championships 800m bronze medallist Kipyegon Bett, three-time Boston Marathon champion Rita Jeptoo and Rio 2016 Olympic marathon champion Jemima Sumgong.

Three-time world champion and Beijing 2008 Olympic 1,500m gold medallist Asbel Kiprop was handed a four-year ban earlier this year.

World half-marathon record holder Abraham Kiptum received a provisional suspension in April after being charged with an ABP violation.

This came two days before he was due to compete at the London Marathon.

In addition, Bahrain's Kenyan-born Olympic marathon silver medallist Eunice Kirwa was last month banned for four years after testing positive for erythropoietin.

It came just days after her younger brother Felix was banned for nine months for failing a drug test for strychnine – a drug normally used as a rat poison.

In 2016, Kenya introduced an anti-doping act to make doping an offence which could be punished by imprisonment.

The country’s recent doping woes prompted the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to investigate, with a report outlining several concerns over the structures in place.

WADA claimed, however, that there had been no evidence of institutionalised doping.

The report instead claimed the doping practices of athletes from the country were "unsophisticated, opportunistic and uncoordinated".

"All dopers must be smoked out until the sport is clean," Barnabas Korir, an Athletics Kenya Executive Committee member, told Reuters.

"There is no other solution.

"There is no alternative to running clean."