FIFA president Sepp Blatter gestures during a press conference on December 19 in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh
AFP/Reuters/Marrakech/Morocco
Only an "earthquake" can change FIFA's decision to hold the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said Friday.
"It would really need an earthquake, extremely important new elements to go back on this World Cup in Qatar," Blatter told a press conference after the FIFA executive committee agreed to release a report on alleged corruption surrounding the tournaments awarded to Russia in 2018 and Qatar in 2022.
"At the current time, there is no reason to go back on our decisions. The two World Cups are in the calendar, the only thing missing is the precise dates for 2022, but these two World Cups will take place," Blatter told the press conference, speaking in German.
FIFA's executive committee has unanimously agreed to allow the publication "in an appropriate form" of the report on the bidding process for the 2018/2022 World Cups, but gave no indication of when it might happen.
Soccer's governing body had previously said it could not publish the 430-page report of former investigator Michael Garcia for legal reasons but will now do so once "ongoing procedures against individuals are concluded", Blatter said.
The governing body had been under pressure to publish a redacted version of Garcia's report to help shed light on what happened during the turbulent process for the tournaments awarded to Russia and Qatar respectively.
In the statement FIFA said it had asked the Adjudicatory Chamber of the Independent Ethics Committee to publish the report in "an appropriate form" once ongoing procedures against individuals are concluded.
"I am pleased they have agreed. It has been a long process to arrive at this point and I understand the views of those who have been critical," Blatter said.
"We have always been determined that the truth should be known. That is, after all, why we set up an independent Ethics Committee with an investigatory chamber that has all necessary means to undertake investigations on its own initiative."
The decision followed a presentation by Domenico Scala, head of FIFA's audit and compliance committee and one of only six people to have seen the report.
Garcia, who said himself that the report should be published, spent 18 months investigating allegations of corruption in the bidding process, during which he interviewed 75 witnesses.
In Friday's statement, Blatter reiterated that the bidding process for the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups would not be re-opened.
"We will not revisit the 2018 and 2022 vote and a report by independent, external legal experts commissioned by Mr. Scala supports the view that there are no legal grounds to revoke the Executive Committee's decision on the award of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups," he said.
"Now it is important that the work of the Ethics Committee continues and that any instances of wrongdoing are fully investigated and their perpetrators pursued and sanctioned."
Garcia, who appealed against the summary of his investigation, saying it contained misrepresentations, resigned on Wednesday, one day after a FIFA tribunal ruled his application to be inadmissible.
Blatter announced on Friday that Swiss lawyer Cornel Borbely would take over as acting chairman of the investigatory chamber and said the full Garcia report has been made available to the Swiss General Attorney's office.
