Swiss attorney general not probing outgoing FIFA president Blatter

Published June 3, 2015 1:38am

ZURICH - Switzerland's office of attorney general (OAG) said on Tuesday it was not investigating outgoing FIFA president Sepp Blatter, who announced he was stepping down in a hastily convened press conference shortly before.

"Joseph S. Blatter is not under investigation by the OAG. His announced resignation will have no influence on the ongoing criminal proceedings," the attorney general said in a brief statement.

The attorney general, which has opened criminal proceedings against persons unknown on suspicion of criminal mismanagement and of money laundering alongside a far wider U.S. corruption investigation into FIFA, said it would release no further information.

Meanwhile, the chief ethics investigator of FIFA said he would keep working at world soccer's governing body to secure compliance with its ethics code, after the organization's president Sepp Blatter announced he was stepping down.

"The (investigatory) chamber will continue its mandate along with the adjudicatory chamber of the Ethics Committee of consistently ensuring compliance with FIFA's Code of Ethics and will make this its highest priority, regardless of who is president," Cornel Borbely, FIFA's chief ethics investigator, said in a statement on Tuesday. "The body's independence from the president, regardless of who is exercising this function, is a key part of good corporate governance."

Borbely's statement came moments after Blatter resigned as FIFA president in the face of a U.S.-led corruption investigation that has plunged world soccer's governing body into the worst crisis in its history. — Reuters

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