Ex-Afghan football chief banned for life, fined $1 million

KABUL’s former football chief Keramuudin Karim has been banned from football for life and also fined $1 million after complaints that he sexually assaulted several female players.

Ethic committee of the global football body, FIFA, found Karim  guilty of abusing his position and sexually abusing female players, the body said.

Karim, also a former FIFA Standing Committee member, was accused by at least five Afghan female football players of repeated sexual abuse between 2013 and 2018, FIFA said in a statement on Saturday. He was also fined 1,000,000 Swiss francs ($1.01m).

In November, President Ashraf Ghani ordered an investigation after Britain’s Guardian newspaper reported that senior figures linked to the Afghan women‘s team had alleged that some players had been molested by officials from the federation.

According to the Guardian, the alleged abuse took place inside the federation’s headquarters in Afghanistan as well as at a training camp in Jordan last February.

FIFA, which began its investigation in December when it suspended Karim, said he had breached ethics code rules on the protection of physical and mental integrity, and abuse of position. The ban applies to any kind of football-related activity.

In March, an Afghan federation official said friendly matches scheduled for outside Afghanistan had been cancelled because so many players had stopped training since the allegations emerged.

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