The Swiss public prosecutor's office has widened an investigation targeting the former president of Fifa Sepp Blatter to a million dollar loan granted in 2010 by the authority to the Football Federation of Trinidad and Tobago (TTFF), learned Saturday AFP. This is "not a new criminal procedure against Joseph Blatter, it is added to all the criminal proceedings" against the former boss of Fifa (1998-2015), said the Public Ministry of Confederation (MPC) in an email. Opened in May, this new part of the investigation targets two other eminent members of the umbrella organization of world football, former secretary general Jérôme Valcke and former financial director Markus Kattner. It relates to a loan of a million dollars (nearly 890,000 euros) that Fifa granted to the TTFF in 2010. Granted without interest or guarantee, the credit would have quickly been transformed into "subsidy", according to a document consulted by AFP.
"I learned of this criticism and completely refuted its content," reacted Mr. Blatter. This new branch of the investigation arises as Fifa is targeted by multiple charges of fraudulent payments intended for Jack Warner, struck off for life by the international federation after having been a member for a long time and indicted for corruption by the American justice. Blatter, 84, benefited in May from the filing of an MPC investigation into the Caribbean Football Union, then led by Warner, being awarded a television rights contract in 2005. But the Switzerland remains under threat from another part of the criminal proceedings, which relates to a late payment, without written record, of 2 million Swiss francs (1.88 million euros) to Michel Platini.
This payment earned the two men a several-year suspension from all football-related activity and prevented Platini from running for president of Fifa to succeed Blatter. In May 2018, Platini was exonerated by the Swiss courts. The decision to classify the part of the investigation relating to television rights has no impact on the rest of the investigations. "The criminal proceedings will continue," hammered the MPC on Saturday.
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