Fifa ethics panel chamber to appeal bans for Platini, Blatter

[ZURICH] The Fifa ethics committee investigative chamber plans to appeal eight-year bans from the sport levied against the world soccer body's president, Joseph "Sepp" Blatter, and European soccer boss Michel Platini, a spokesman for the panel said on Tuesday.

Blatter and Platini last month were both banned from soccer for eight years for ethics violations, leaving the global game leaderless as it seeks to dig itself out from beneath a slew of corruption cases. Both have denied wrongdoing.

The two escaped potential lifetime bans demanded by investigators when the ethic committee's adjudicatory chamber found no evidence of bribery linked to a 2 million Swiss franc (US$2 million) payment that Fifa made to Platini in 2011, with Blatter's approval.

REUTERS