Central Asia: How Far Does Football Match-Fixing Scandal Go?

European authorities say they have uncovered a vast conspiracy to fix football matches in Europe, Asia and South America. How much do you want to bet that clubs from Central Asia, a region that features some of the most corrupt nations in the world, were involved?

Officials at Europol – a pan-European law enforcement agency based in The Hague – say they have identified 380 football matches that were rigged. A Europol statement said the conspiracy originated in Asia and involved at least 425 individuals – including match referees, club officials, players and members of organized criminal gangs . The statement doesn’t provide specific names, places or dates, but it does indicate that high-profile international matches were fixed. In all, the rigged games are believed to have generated 8 million euros in gambling profits, the Europol statement indicates.

“Among the 380 or more suspicious matches identified by this case are World Cup and European Championship qualification matches, two UEFA Champions League matches and several top-flight matches in European national leagues. In addition, another 300 suspicious matches were identified outside Europe, mainly in Africa, Asia, South and Central America,” the Europol statement said.

Other information contained in the Europol release suggested that there’s a good possibility that clubs in former Soviet states are involved. “The organized criminal group behind most of these activities has been betting primarily on the Asian market,” the statement said. “The ringleaders are of Asian origin, working closely together with European facilitators. During the investigation, links were also found to Russian-speaking and other criminal syndicates.”

Central Asia’s biggest football power just happens to be Uzbekistan, a country that Transparency International in its 2012 corruption perceptions index rated as tied for 170th out of the 174 nations surveyed. In light of the match-fixing scandal, the success of Uzbek teams in international competitions in recent years may come under scrutiny.

The Europol-led investigation, codenamed Operation Veto, lasted from July 2011 until January of this year.