(Reuters) – Sri Lankan cricketers have been granted a 15-day amnesty to report previously undisclosed information relating to corruption in the sport, the International Cricket Council (ICC) announced yesterday.
The amnesty will apply to all participants under both the ICC and Sri Lankan Cricket (SLC) anti-corruption codes who have previously failed to report information relating to wrongdoing.
Players can be suspended for failing to pass on information about corruption but anything reported between Jan. 16-31 will not attract a charge, the ICC said in a statement.
Failure to do so, however, could result in a ban from cricket for up to five years.
The move comes in the wake of a series of corruption cases involving former Sri Lanka internationals and administrators.
“This is the first time the ICC has held an amnesty and it is in response to the very specific challenges we face in Sri Lanka,” the general manager of the ICC’s anti-corruption unit Alex Marshall said. “Allowing retrospective reporting of alleged approaches to engage in corrupt conduct will assist in our ongoing and wide-ranging investigations, as well as enabling us to continue to develop a comprehensive picture of the situation there.”
Following a meeting in Dubai last month, Sri Lanka’s sports minister Harin Fernando said the ICC had ranked the country’s cricket administration “corrupt from top to bottom”.
Former captain and selector Sanath Jayasuriya was charged in October by the ICC for refusing to cooperate with ICC’s anti-corruption unit. He denied any wrongdoing.
Former Sri Lankan bowler Dilhara Lokuhettige was charged last year for violating the anti-corruption code relating to a 10-over league in the United Arab Emirates, while the country’s former paceman and bowling coach Nuwan Zoysa was provisionally suspended by SLC over match-fixing accusations.
Neither Lokuhettige nor Zoysa has responded publicly to the charges against them.
