BERN: The office for the Swiss Attorney General has said that new evidence has emerged of 28 new acts of possible money laundering in relation to the bidding contests for football’s the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

The office added that it now has 81 “suspicious activity reports” filed by banks in the country. Last month, Attorney General Michael Lauber said that there were 53 suspicious incidents to study as part of a “huge and complex case.”

Russia will host the 2018 FIFA World Cup and Qatar will stage the 2022 edition of the tournament, with both countries having denied any wrongdoing as part of the bidding process.

Lauber’s office said that it was “very pleased with analysis work done by the Money Laundering Reporting Office Switzerland as it is of great support to the (Swiss) criminal proceedings,” according to the Associated Press news agency.

Meanwhile Jeffrey Webb, one of several football officials arrested in May in Zurich, Switzerland is understood to have agreed to be extradited and face corruption charges in the United States.

Webb, the former president of Concacaf, the sport’s governing body in Central and North America, is set to be the first of those arrested on May 27 in Switzerland to face a US judge.

Switzerland’s Federal Office of Justice approved his extradition “immediately in a simplified process,” and Webb will be handed over to the US authorities by the end of this month.

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