Lausanne (AFP)

The Swiss prosecution has classified one of the investigations targeting since 2015 the former president of Fifa Sepp Blatter, already cleared in May 2020 in another component and currently hospitalized, we learned Thursday from a judicial source.

The ex-N.1 of world football was suspected of having wronged the Zurich-based body by making him pay the invoice of 365,000 dollars (300,000 euros) for a private jet flight carried out in 2007 by the Trinidadian Jack Warner , since banned for corruption and indicted by American justice.

Prosecutor Thomas Hildbrand, who is leading proceedings for "unfair management" relating to several separate facts, "classified" this component "in January," the federal prosecutor's office told AFP, confirming information from the daily Le Monde.

The Confederation's Public Prosecutor's Office (MPC) did not indicate the reasons for this classification, which follows that in May 2020 of a case of television rights attributed by Fifa in 2005 to the Caribbean Football Union, to the era led by Mr. Warner.

"An appeal has been filed against this classification order and it is now up to the Complaints Court of the Federal Criminal Court to rule on this subject", specifies the MPC.

Three investigations remain against the former president of Fifa, swept away in 2015 by corruption scandals: first the controversial payment of 2 million Swiss francs (1.8 million euros) to Michel Platini - then president of UEFA - in 2011, validated by Blatter without a written contract, and which led to the two men being prosecuted for "unfair management", "swindle" and "breach of trust".

Since last May, the Swiss justice is also interested in a loan of one million dollars (823,000 euros) granted in 2010 by Fifa to the Football Federation of Trinidad and Tobago, then chaired by Jack Warner.

Finally, the body now headed by the Italo-Swiss Gianni Infantino filed a complaint last December against his former boss for "criminal mismanagement", because of the pharaonic project of the football museum in Zurich, which resulted according to the instance an invoice for 500 million Swiss francs (462 million euros).

Sepp Blatter, tested positive for Covid-19 in November, has been hospitalized since December after a heart operation.

His condition is improving "little by little" and he should stay "another two weeks" in the hospital, according to his spokesperson.

© 2021 AFP