Brussels, 18/09/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European Parliament is seeking to tackle fraud in sport and match fixing. On Monday 17 September, during a hearing at the CRIM committee in charge of fighting organised crime, corruption and money laundering, it called for a European framework to harmonise the response of all 27 member states. This European framework was put forward by Emine Bozkurt (S&D, the Netherlands) and calls on all member states to include a criminal code in their response to the phenomenon, in addition to a harmonised definition of match fixing.
This hearing is expected to underpin the EU sport forum meeting, bringing together ministers and stakeholders and planned for 19-20 September in Nicosia. The issue of match fixing will be on the meeting agenda. Ministers are also expected to adopt a declaration at this meeting. Italy is regularly affected by this phenomenon and was recently investigated with regard to a new match fixing scandal in its football league, which involved mafia organisations. The phenomenon is, however, far from affecting just a minority of countries or restricted to a single one, explained Emine Bozkurt on Monday, upstream from the EU hearing. The UEFA has detected a scourge affecting 19 member states and four EU candidate countries. Eastern Europe and the Balkan countries are particularly affected by sports fraud. According to a study presented by Bozkurt, football clubs and federations in Bulgaria, Ukraine, Serbia and Russia have been infiltrated by mafia and criminal groups and football clubs are often used by them as cover for many other criminal operations.
At the end of September, Commissioner Michel Barnier will present his action plan on gaming and online betting. This is also expected to contain a reference to the fight against sports fraud. The Council of Europe is also involved in preparing an agreement on match fixing. Several member states, such as Italy and Portugal, have already included sports fraud under their criminal law statutes, while other countries include it in laws governing sport (Greece and Poland). According to the EP study, however, there are some states that still do not regard sports fraud as a crime. (SP/trans/fl)