Fifa officials arrested on corruption charges as World Cup inquiry launched

Fifa officials, clockwise from top left, Rafael Esquivel, Nicolás Leoz, Jeffrey Webb, Jack Warner, José Maria Marin, Eugenio Figueredo and Eduardo Li, who are among those charged by the US Department of Justice with allegedly receiving bribes worth more than $100m. 

The world governing body of football, Fifa, was plunged into an unprecedented crisis on the eve of its congress in Zurich after Swiss authorities arrested a string of officials in a dawn raid and opened criminal proceedings over the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
More than a dozen plainclothed officers descended on the five-star Baur au Lac hotel on Wednesday, where officials had gathered for Fifa’s annual meeting.
The arrests were made on behalf of US authorities, after an FBI investigation that has been ongoing for at least three years. The US Department of Justice said authorities had charged 14 officials, nine of whom are current or former Fifa executives. Those arrested in Zurich face extradition to the US.

Hours later, Swiss federal prosecutors said they had opened criminal proceedings in connection with the award of the 2018 World Cup to Russia and the 2022 tournament to Qatar. The decisions have been shrouded in claims of bribery and corruption ever since the vote in December 2010.
The Swiss authorities seized “electronic data and documents” in a raid on Fifa headquarters. Bank documents had earlier been collected from various Swiss financial institutions. Police will question 10 members of the Fifa executive committee who took part in the World Cup votes. The 10, all still current members of Fifa’s ExCo, include the senior vice president Issa Hayatou of Cameroon and Vitaly Mutko, Russia’s sports minister who is head of the country’s 2018 World Cup organising committee. The others are Angel Maria Villar Llona (Spain), Michel D’Hooghe (Belgium), Senes Erzik (Turkey), Worawi Makudi (Thailand), Marios Lefkaritis (Cyprus), Jacques Anouma (Ivory Coast), Rafael Salguero (Guatemala) and Hany Abo Rida (Egypt).
In a statement, the Swiss attorney general’s office said the executives were being questioned on suspicion of “criminal mismanagement” and money laundering. It said the timing of the operation was deliberately co-ordinated with the arrests on behalf of the US authorities “to avoid any possible collusion” between suspects and because a large number of those involved in the voting for the two World Cups were present in Zurich, where Fifa president Sepp Blatter was expected to be re-elected for another four-year term on Friday.

‘We instigated the investigation which led to arrests’ – Fifa spokesman Walter De Gregorio, at a press conference on Wednesday

At a later press conference at Fifa headquarters, spokesman Walter de Gregorio denied Blatter was in any way involved with either investigation and said that the Swiss proceedings were as a result of information provided by Fifa to the attorney general’s office in November 2014. He also confirmed that there was no suggestion that Russia or Qatar would lose the World Cup.
The arrests on behalf of the US authorities form part of an international investigation into bribes worth $100m (£65m) spanning three decades. The allegations date back to the 1990s and involve “the acceptance of bribes and kickbacks”, Swiss officials said.
Fifa vice-president Jeffrey Webb, of the Cayman Islands, was among those arrested. He is the head of Fifa’s north American regional body, known as Concacaf, which reported itself to US tax authorities in 2012.
The organisation had not paid taxes for several years when its president was Jack Warner and Chuck Blazer was secretary general.
As well as Webb, the Department of Justice statement confirmed the Fifa officials charged were Eugenio Figueredo, Jack Warner, Eduardo Li, Julio Rocha, Costas Takkas, Rafael Esquivel and José Maria Marin and Nicolás Leoz. A further four defendants were the sports marketing executives Alejandro Burzaco, Aaron Davidson, Hugo Jinkis and Mariano Jinkis. A further marketing executive, José Marguiles, was charged as an intermediary.
The DoJ statement confirmed the charges were for racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracies, “among other offences” and alleged a “24-year scheme to enrich themselves through the corruption of international soccer”. The charges were announced by the US Attorney General Loretta Lynch.