Switzerland's top prosecutor said Friday that criminal proceedings had been opened against FIFA chief Sepp Blatter, on suspicion that he misappropriated funds and violated his duties as the head of world football's governing body.
BERN, Switzerland – A 12-member committee set up by FIFA to draw up far-reaching reforms to the organization in the wake of a corruption scandal met for the first time in Bern on Wednesday.
GENEVA, Switzerland – The Swiss Justice Ministry will rule next month on the extradition requests filed by the United States against six FIFA officials who have been accused of corruption, a spokesman said Monday.
The assets put up to guarantee the $20 million bond include cash deposits of $3.3 million, to be made by October 1, and three properties in the United States owned by his sister and a close friend.
"We say 'yes' to Russia," Blatter said during a meeting with the Russian leader near St. Petersburg on Saturday. "Our support is especially important during the current geopolitical situation," Blatter said.
"If evidence exists that Qatar and Russia received the [World Cup] awards only thanks to bribes, then the awards could be annulled," head of FIFA's auditing and compliance committee Domenico Scala told the Sonntagszeitung weekly.
Read about the man who set the investigation in motion, with a book in 2006, "FOUL! The Secret World of FIFA: Bribes, Vote-Rigging and Ticket Scandals," followed by an exposé aired on the BBC's "Panorama" program that same year, and then another book in 2014, called "Omerta: Sepp Blatter's FIFA Organised Crime Family."
ZURICH, Switzerland – Sepp Blatter on Tuesday resigned as president of FIFA as a mounting corruption scandal engulfed world football's governing body. Read his statement here.
FIFA on Tuesday admitted that it had processed a $10 million payment from South Africa to a disgraced football official but denied the world body's secretary general Jerome Valcke was involved. FIFA released a statement after The New York Times reported that Valcke, right hand man to FIFA leader Sepp Blatter, had signed off on the payment.
"If I have been in FIFA for 30 years and I have been thiefing all the money, who give me the money?" Jack Warner asked his supporters gathered in Trinidad. After one blurted out, "Blatter!" Warner asked, "And why it is he ain't charged?"
