Krakow, 14/10/2011 (Agence Europe) - At the meeting of European sports ministers in Krakow, Poland, on Thursday 13 October, the top priority was the fight against match-fixing. Following his address on 28 September to the Council of Europe, the head of European football association UEFA, Michel Platini, said that he expected action to be taken to deal with match-fixing and expected European politicians to come up with a serious plan to tackle the problem in all forms of sport. He said UEFA was doing a lot itself and putting a lot of money into warning systems, but did not have any legal stick to use when against suspects.
Michel Platini said that match-fixing must be seen as a crime, as is already the case in the legal systems of Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Bulgaria, Poland and Portugal, and called for recognition of the fact that sports organisations own their competitions, to ensure that European football is not jeopardised by online betting and organised crime. France is the first country in the EU to have added this to its legal system.
The French sports minister and former judo champion, David Douillet, said it was time to tackle the problem head-on and called for each country to add the crime of sport fraud to its legal system so that Platini can tackle match-fixing. Douillet said that match-fixing damaged the international market and caused everyone to suffer. He said one of the solutions was to create a global authority for online betting, as had been done for doping, which could be under the aegis of the International Olympics Committee (IOC). He explained that only the IOC is strong enough to incentivise countries to introduce new legislation on a global scale, failing which match-fixers would simply move to countries where match-fixing is not a crime. The funding of such a body could be shared by private players affected by the phenomenon. Douillet's special advisor, Fabien Canu, suggested that so much money was at stake that a small tax could be introduced to finance such a regulatory body. This idea was backed by the Polish sports minister, Adam Giersz, who said it was an international problem that required international solutions.
EU Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou made her feelings very clear, saying that match-fixing was one of the worst enemies of sport. Cooperation and coordination is required in the EU among EU institutions, member states and sports bodies, she explained, adding that a database should be set up because this is a crime against international law. The Polish Presidency is awaiting a conclusions document from the Council on this issue, hopefully on 29 November 2011, when the EU27 sports ministers will be meeting in Brussels. (VW/transl.fl)