Blatter deputy denies bribe claims

Fifa president Sepp Blatter's top deputy has denied allegations that he is the high-ranking official who made key payments in a bribery scandal engulfing world football.

The New York Times and other media named Jerome Valcke as the person responsible for a $10m (£6m) transfer of funds cited in a US indictment.

Fifa has denied that Valcke or other managers were involved in the payment or the project it was destined for.

Valcke is not under indictment.

Last Wednesday, world football was rocked when seven senior Fifa officials were detained at an annual convention in Zurich, among 14 people indicted by US prosecutors.

Blatter is not one of the accused. He went on to win re-election for a fifth term as Fifa president, extending his 16-year reign.

On Monday, Valcke announced that he would not be attending the opening of the Women's World Cup in Canada on 6 June as planned - a move that correspondents called "highly unusual".

The claims about Valcke relate to a central corruption case being investigated by US authorities - the alleged payment of bribes over South Africa's hosting of the 2010 World Cup.

Prosecutors say a $10m payment was made from Fifa to accounts controlled by Jack Warner, the former vice president of Fifa who is among the 14 former or current Fifa officials and executives charged last Wednesday.

Prosecutors allege that the payment constituted a bribe to Warner in exchange for his support for South Africa's bid to host the 2010 World Cup.

The bribe was promised in 2004, as Fifa considered the bid, but in the years afterwards South Africa was unable to pay, the indictment says.

So in 2008 Fifa itself made the payment to a group controlled by Warner, diverting funds that would have gone to South Africa in support of the tournament.

Warner took much of that money, prosecutors say, for his personal use.

Warner, who has become a politician since leaving Fifa, says he is innocent of all the charges.

Unnamed US officials and well-placed sources told the New York Times, Wall St Journal and Reuters news agency that the unidentified "high-ranking official" alleged in paragraph 192 of the indictment to have "caused" the payments was Valcke, Fifa's secretary general.

Valcke is not named as a defendant and the indictment does not suggest the official knew the money was allegedly being used as a bribe.

In a brief email to the New York Times, Valcke said he had not authorized the payment and had no power to do so.

A Fifa spokeswoman said the payment was authorized by the then-finance committee chairman, Julio Grondona, who died last year.

Fifa, meanwhile, agrees that the South African government approved a $10m payment in 2007.

But in a statement it said the funds went towards a legitimate "project to support the African diaspora in Caribbean countries as part of the World Cup legacy" - an account echoed by key South African officials.

"The payments totaling $10m were authorized by the then chairman of the Finance Committee and executed in accordance with the Organisation Regulations of Fifa," the statement said.

"Neither the Secretary General Jerome Valcke nor any other member of Fifa's senior management were involved in the initiation, approval and implementation of the above project," it goes on to say.