Russia and Qatar were cleared today by a FIFA judge of corruption in their winning bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
FIFA ethics judge Joachim Eckert formally ended a probe into the bidding contests, almost four years after the vote by the governing body's scandal-tainted executive committee. No proof was found of bribes or voting pacts.
"The evaluation of the 2018/2022 FIFA World Cups bidding process is closed for the FIFA Ethics Committee," the German judge wrote in a statement released by FIFA.
The 2022 World Cup will finally, it seems, be played in Qatar, though exactly when is still unclear as FIFA seeks an alternative to the desert heat in June and July.
"FIFA welcomes the fact that a degree of closure has been reached," the governing body said today in a statement. "As such, FIFA looks forward to continuing the preparations for Russia 2018 and Qatar 2022, which are already well underway."
The Qatari organising committee said it would study the report before commenting.
Despite finding wrongdoing among the 11 bidding nations, Eckert said the integrity of the December 2010 votes was not affected.
"In particular, the effects of these occurrences on the bidding process as a whole were far from reaching any threshold that would require returning to the bidding process, let alone reopening it," he summarised.
The corruption case is still open for past and current members of FIFA's ruling board.
Critics of FIFA have long relied on Eckert and ethics prosecutor Michael Garcia to build a case to remove the wealthy desert emirate as host in 2022 by proving suspicions that votes and influence were bought. Qatar beat the United States 14-8 in the final round of a five-nation contest. But any hope of re-running the vote ended as FIFA released Eckert's 42-page summary findings of the investigation reports, which have stayed secret against Garcia's wishes.
Whistleblower evidence from a former Qatar bid staffer who said there were illicit payments made to African voters was dismissed.
