Former China Football Association chief sentenced to life for bribery, while South Korean player Son Jun-ho is released
- Ex-chairman of the FA Chen Xuyuan was jailed as part of a corruption investigation for taking bribes worth US$11.2 million
- Son, part of South Korea’s World Cup squad and who played for a Chinese club, was freed after almost a year in detention
The former chairman of the Chinese Football Association (CFA) was jailed for life on Tuesday for taking bribes worth 81.03 million yuan (US$11.2 million), part of a sprawling corruption investigation into the game on the mainland.
Chen Xuyuan sought “improper benefits for multiple football clubs and local football associations, seriously damaging fair competition and order in the football sector”, the Communist Party-run People’s Daily reported.
Separately, China released a former member of the South Korean national men’s football team who had been held in detention for nearly a year on allegations of taking bribes.
Son Jun-ho, a midfielder who played for Shandong Taishan FC in the Chinese Super League, had arrived back in South Korea, the Foreign Ministry in Seoul said on Tuesday in a statement.
Chinese prosecutors said Chen had taken bribes for more than a decade, and the criminal activity could be divided into two significant periods in his life.
Between 2010 to 2019, when Chen was the president and chairman at Shanghai International Port Group – the company that owns Shanghai SIPG and won the Chinese Super League in 2018 – he accepted bribes “in particularly large amounts”, either directly or through his wife and son.