AFC forms task force against Asian match-fixing

S INGAPORE: The A sian Football Confederation (AFC) has set up a task force to help combat match- fixing in the continent, the sport’s regional governing body said yesterday.

The announcement came a day af ter an INTERPOL- led conference into result rigging closed in Kuala Lumpur. The task force would col laborate with all stakeholders and educate member associations on ways to combat the practice and introduce mechanisms to fight it, AFC General Secretary Alex Soosay said in a statement.

“By setting up this task force, we would like to coordinate the education, training and implementation of measures through one platform,” he said.

Earlier this month, European anti- crime agency Europol said hundreds of soccer matches were fi xed in a global betting scam run from Singapore.

It also identified about 680 suspicious matches, including qualifying games for the World Cup and European Championships, and for Europe’s Champions League.

Tan Seet Eng, a Singaporean also known as Dan Tan, has been accused of heading an organisat ion to f ix soccer matches worldwide and Italian police have issued an arrest warrant for him.

Italian police arrested a fugitive associate of the alleged matchf ixing kingpin on Thursday after the 31-year- old Slovenian, a former player, f lew in from Singapore to hand himself over to authorities.

Singapore says Tan is not a wanted man in the citystate but it is working with European authorities looking into the syndicate. Singapore pol ice s a id on Thursday a team of four officers would be sent to INTERPOL within the next two weeks to assist in the investigations. — Reuters