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Blatter cleared in bribery investigation

Qatari Mohamed Bin Hammam, who hours earlier had ended his campaign to unseat Blatter, was temporarily suspended along with Jack Warner, president of the CONCACAF region covering north and central America and the Caribbean.

Blatter was cleared of any breach of FIFA's statutes following an emergency sitting of the independent committee, freeing him to stand unopposed for a fourth term in charge of FIFA in Wednesday's election.

Bin Hammam and Warner were accused of arranging to pay delegates of the Caribbean Football Union $40,000 in cash to vote for Blatter's only rival.

Both men are long-standing members of FIFA's all-powerful 24-man executive committee, 10 of whom have been subject to allegations of corruption in the last year.

The case against Warner and Bin Hammam, who have denied any wrongdoing, will be heard in July, according to Namibian judge Petrus Damaseb who chaired Sunday's meeting.

"KANGAROO COURT"

"Blatter has to be stopped," he said of his former long-term ally. "They came premeditated, they weren't prepared to listen, they were hand-picked to do a task and they did just that," he said of the hearing.

"The guys were hand-picked by Blatter... a kangaroo court would be a decent thing to say."

"I am not FIFA, I can't change the agenda," Valcke said. "It is up to the delegates - they have the final say."

Valcke agreed that FIFA was facing "a watershed moment," drawing comparisons with the International Olympic Committee's crisis when IOC delegates were found guilty of taking bribes for votes to award the 2002 Winter Games to Salt Lake City.

This crisis, whose tentacles spread into the very heart of the senior governance of the world's most popular and richest sport, has arguably greater implications.

While FIFA's financial situation is sound, recent scandals have provoked widespread calls for reform of the powerful executive committee at the organisation's heart.