FIFA president Sepp Blatter came out fighting yesterday as he began his fifth term in charge of soccer’s governing body, implying that the US timed the announcement of a major corruption probe to try to scupper his re-election bid.
The 79-year-old Swiss comfortably won Friday’s vote at a FIFA congress in Zurich, having secured the support of blocks of votes from Asia and Africa, which outweighed dissenters including Europe’s powerful soccer body, UEFA.
He now faces the daunting task of restoring public faith in an organization tainted by allegations of graft and deeply divided over his leadership.
In an interview late on Friday, he showed few signs of wanting to unite one of the world’s most powerful sports bodies, which takes in billions of dollars in revenue from TV marketing rights and sponsorships.
“No one is going to take it off me that it was a simple coincidence [that] this American attack [happened] two days before the elections of FIFA,” Blatter told the RTS Swiss TV channel in an interview. “Why didn’t they [the police] do this in March when we had the same meeting? At that time, we had less journalists.”
In a dawn swoop on a Zurich hotel on Wednesday, Swiss police arrested seven leading soccer officials, including FIFA vice president Jeffrey Webb.
The arrests were connected to a bribery scandal being investigated by US, Swiss and other law enforcement agencies that plunged FIFA into the worst crisis in its 111-year history.
Blatter also singled out UEFA, whose president Michel Platini had called for his resignation.
“It is a hate not only by one person of UEFA, but by the organization of UEFA, that has not understood that I have been president since 1998,” Blatter said. “I forgive everyone, but I don’t forget.”
Blatter has not been implicated in any wrongdoing, but having ruled FIFA for nearly 20 years, during which it has regularly been subject to suspicions of graft, his critics said it was time for him to step down.
A senior US Internal Revenue Service official on Friday said he thought there would be further indictments, the New York Times reported, without naming who might be indicted.
A magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck off the southern coast of Mindanao in the Philippines at 7:38am today, prompting the US Tsunami Warning System to issue an alert for neighboring countries, including Taiwan. The system issued a purple alert indicating a "tsunami threat." The potential threat zone includes Taiwan, the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, Yap and Palau. Philippine authorities were assessing the damage from the quake, with the office of civil defense seeking to verifying initial reports that 15 people had been killed and 129 injured in the region, mostly from falling debris. Arlene Hollero, disaster chief of Maasim town in the Philippines' Sarangani Province,
RESILIENCE: Taiwan plays a key role in semiconductors, energy, information infrastructure and advanced manufacturing, AIT Director Raymond Greene said Taiwan’s continued investment in deterrence and resilience remains vital, especially in uncrewed systems and other emerging technologies, American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Director Raymond Greene said yesterday. Greene made the remarks at the annual National Strategic Summit on Supply Chain Resilience held by the Research Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET), a government-backed think tank. As Taiwan last year became the US’ fourth-largest trading partner and supply chain security is becoming more important, cooperation in emerging technologies continues to deepen between the two countries, he said. The US is committed to accelerating innovation, building key infrastructure, strengthening cooperation
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The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
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