Beckenbauer banned over Qatar probe

Franz Beckenbauer has been suspended from all football activity for 90 days by the sport's world governing body FIFA.

The German football great and former member of FIFA's executive committee had refused to cooperate with an investigation by FIFA ethics committee into Qatar's controversial win in the race to host the 2022 World Cup, a statement by the ethics committee said.

Alan Sullivan, the deputy chairman of the FIFA ethics committee's adjudicatory chamber, issued the ban at the request of the chairman of the investigatory chamber, Michael Garcia, a former US federal prosecutor, the statement said.

The ban is effective immediately, it added.

The decision follows Beckenbauer's decision not to respond to Garcia's inquiries in the corruption probe into Qatar's bid.

Beckenbauer took part in the 2022 vote for the World Cup hosts in 2010 as a FIFA executive at the time.

Britain's Daily Telegraph and Germany's Die Welt newspapers had reported that Beckenbauer refused to answer FIFA investigator Garcia.

Beckenbauer, a World Cup winner with West Germany as both player and coach, this week rejected those reports, saying he had only asked to have Garcia's questions in the German language instead of the original English but his request was rejected.

"I was ready to answer all the relevant questions. However, they were in legal English and I did not fully understand such complicated material," he said.

"I asked kindly for a discussion in the German language and this was rejected.

"I only have an adviser status with FIFA. I am no longer a commission member and therefore I am not obliged to talk to Mr Garcia."

FIFA's statement said the decision to hand Beckenbauer a provisional suspension was "on the grounds that a breach of the Code of Ethics appears to have been committed and a decision on the main issue may not be taken early enough."

It added: "The apparent breach relates to Mr Beckenbauer's failure to cooperate with an Ethics Committee investigation despite repeated requests for his assistance, including requests that he provide information during an in-person interview or in response to written questions provided in both English and German.

"The case is now the subject of formal investigation proceedings being conducted by investigatory chamber member Vanessa Allard as chief of the investigation."