Lausanne: Swiss prosecutors said on Tuesday they had charged three former German Football Association (DFB) officials, including ex-president Theo Zwanziger, with fraud relating to the 2006 World Cup.
In a statement the attorney general’s office said the accused “are alleged to have fraudulently misled the members of a supervisory body of the DFB organising committee for the 2006 World Cup in Germany” in April 2005 about the true purpose of a payment of around 6.7 million euros.
Hors Schmidt, former secretary of the German football federation, has also been charged with fraud — along with the Swiss Urs Linsi, secretary general of FIFA from June 1999 to June 2007.
Wolfgang Niersbach, who was a member of the 2006 bid committee and vice-president of the organising committee, has been charged with complicity in fraud.
Charges of money-laundering were dismissed in July.
All four have denied the claims.
“This whole Swiss campaign is wretched, malicious and will completely fail, because I have nothing to reproach myself for,” Zwanziger told AFP subsidiary SID. (AFP)
