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Bin Hammam appeal against FIFA ban begins

Bin Hammam

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (Reuters) – Sport’s highest tribunal met on Wednesday to hear the appeal of former FIFA

presidential candidate Mohamed Bin Hammam against his life ban from football for bribery.

Bin Hammam

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) hearing was due to last

two days although a decision is not expected for several weeks.

Bin Hammam was not among the officials who entered the

building for the hearing, a Reuters television cameraman at the scene said. Sources close to the hearing said the Qatari

former head of the Asian Football Confederation would not attend.

Instead, he would be represented by his team of

American and Swiss lawyers.

Bin Hammam challenged Sepp Blatter for the FIFA presidency last year.

He withdrew

his candidacy and was then provisionally suspended days before the June election over allegations that he had tried to buy

the votes of Caribbean officials by handing them $40,000 each in brown envelopes.

Blatter was subsequently re-elected

unopposed for a fourth term as FIFA president, while Bin Hammam was found guilty of breaking seven articles of FIFA’s ethics

code, including one on bribery.

He was banned for life and subsequently lost an appeal at FIFA.

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