Report: Qatar spied on Swiss prosecutor, FIFA boss meeting

By GRAHAM DUNBAR
AP Sports Writer

GENEVA (AP) — A Swiss newspaper says a spying operation on behalf of World Cup host Qatar bugged a 2017 hotel meeting between FIFA president Gianni Infantino and Switzerland’s then-attorney general. They met during a years-long investigation of soccer officials. The probe had begun by looking for financial wrongdoing linked to World Cup host candidates including Qatar’s winning 2022 bid. The Neue Zürcher Zeitung daily says intelligence operatives linked to a former CIA officer wiretapped Infantino and Swiss federal prosecutor Michael Lauber at a Qatari-owned hotel in Bern in June 2017. The Qatari government’s international media office called the NZZ report “another attempt to spread false information about Qatar.”