Cricket:Pakistan's top crime investigative agency will send a team to Britain this week to probe corruption allegations against some of the country's cricket players.
Investigations by British police and the International Cricket Council (ICC) are already underway into a newspaper report alleging three Pakistan players had been bribed to “spot-fix” incidents in last week's fourth test against England.
London police have confiscated the mobile phones of test captain Salman Butt as well as pace bowlers Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif, and the trio - plus wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal - have been questioned at the team's hotel.
A senior official at the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in Karachi said the three-member team was likely to leave for London on Wednesday and planned to meet British police and players.
It is expected the quartet will be asked to withdraw from the forthcoming Twenty20 internationals and one-day internationals, which begin on Sunday at Cardiff.
The weekend’s allegations in the News of the World named the four players in connection with a plot to deliberately bowl no-balls to order at Lord’s.
Mazhar Majeed, a Croydon-based businessman, was subsequently arrested in connection with the matter and questioned for 24 hours before being released without charge on police bail on Sunday evening. Butt, Asif and Aamer were also interviewed by police at the team hotel and had their mobile phones confiscated.
There have been calls for the players involved to be left out of the side for the remainder of the tour but PCB chairman Ijaz Butt stressed last night that the allegations remain just that, with no charges proven, and therefore there are no immediate plans to suspend the players.
International Cricket Council chief executive Haroon Lorgat, meanwhile, is seeking a swift resolution to his organisation’s investigation into the affair. Lorgat said: “I intend to get across to London myself to make sure that such occurrences on Thursday may not transpire, in that we’ve concluded before then what we have to do.
“But it is evidence we are trying to gather. It is a difficult process, allegations have been levelled — serious ones, if I may say — and we will do our utmost to ensure that before any players who are found to be guilty actually take the field of play, (they) are brought to book.”