United States hand FIFA $201m confiscated from corrupt football officials

The US Department of Justice has agreed to hand FIFA $201 million which was confiscated from corrupt football administrators.

FIFA made the announcement on Tuesday.

Most of the money comes from US legal actions in the wake of the FIFAgate scandal, which erupted in May 2015 with the shocking arrest of seven world football executives in Zurich and led to the departure of Sepp Blatter, who was FIFA’s head since 1998.

“This money was seized from the bank accounts of former officials who were involved in, and then prosecuted for, years of corruption schemes in football,” said FIFA in a statement on its website.

The world governing body disclosed that it had set up a ‘World Football Remission Fund’ under the supervision of the FIFA foundation to use the money “to help finance football-related projects with positive community impact across the globe”.

Gianni Infantino, who replaced Blatter as FIFA President, welcomed the deal.