October 23- FIFA has imposed worldwide bans on three more El Salvador national team players in an ongoing match-fixing investigation, bringing the total to 19.
The three players, who have not been named, were originally banned by their federation for six months, 12 months and five years from all football-related activities, respectively.
The case, which has been an unwanted diversion from Concacaf’s efforts to enter a new era of honesty and integrity, surrounds a number of international matches, including El Salvador’s 5-0 loss to Mexico at the 2011 Gold Cup and a 2-1 defeat in a friendly against the United States in 2010.
A FIFA statement said: “The chairman of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee has decided to extend the sanctions to have worldwide effect in accordance with article 78 paragraph 1(c) and article 136ff of the FIFA Disciplinary Code. The concerned parties were notified of the decision today.
“The Disciplinary Committee of the El Salvador FA decided to impose the sanctions on 9 October 2013. This followed investigations conducted by the El Salvador FA into incidents of match manipulation that occurred in international matches, including friendlies and CONCACAF Gold Cup matches, of the El Salvador national “A” team in 2010, as well as matches involving the El Salvador U-20 national team.
“FIFA continues to work closely with its member associations and the confederations to tackle match manipulation. As part of a ten-year programme of collaboration with INTERPOL, regional workshops involving key stakeholders are being held all over the world while recently launched e-learning programmes are also helping to educate players, coaches and referees on the dangers of match manipulation to help them to avoid becoming victims of this threat to football integrity.
“Other initiatives include the signing of an integrity declaration by officials, the monitoring of the betting market via FIFA’s subsidiary Early Warning System (EWS) and the setting up of an e-learning ethics tool, an integrity hotline and e-mail address, and a confidential reporting system.”