Blatter knew of ‘bribes’ to Fifa officials
Thu, July 12, 2012 - 5:07 PM
Fifa president Sepp Blatter was aware senior officials were paid millions of pounds, according to a court investigation into bribery claims.
Former president Joao Havelange and executive committee member Ricardo Teixeira were named on Wednesday as having received huge sums by Fifa's former marketing partner ISL.
Neither were disciplined by Fifa.
Instead, Fifa paid £1.64m (2.5m Swiss francs) to a Swiss court on condition criminal proceedings were dropped.
On Fifa's website Blatter says he knew about the payments but that they were legal at the time.
He said: "Back then, such payments could even be deducted from tax as a business expense. Today, that would be punishable under law.
"You can't judge the past on the basis of today's standards. Otherwise it would end up with moral justice. I can't have known about an offence that wasn't even one."
Switzerland's supreme court ordered the publication of the documents identifying which senior officials took millions of dollars in payments from ISL, which collapsed into bankruptcy in 2001. (BBC)
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