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Charges ‘shocking, shameful’

Criminal corruption charges laid in London against three Pakistani cricketers were “shocking and shameful” for their country, senior sporting figures said on Friday.

Mohammad Aamer, Mohammad Asif and Salman Butt, together with their agent Mazhar Majeed, have been charged with conspiracy to obtain and accept corrupt payments and conspiracy to cheat by England’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

“It is very shocking and shameful for Pakistan and for our cricket,” former Pakistan chief selector Iqbal Qasim said.

“It’s unexpected, because we were thinking that the players will be punished by the ICC (International Cricket Council) in the spot fixing case, but CPS charges are grave.” The charges relate to alleged incidents during a Test match against England last year when Britain’s News of the World tabloid claimed the players were willing to deliberately bowl no-balls.

A separate ICC tribunal is due to announce the conclusions from its own probe into the matter in Doha on Saturday. Former Pakistan Cricket Board chief executive Arif Abassi blamed the organisation for mishandling the spot-fixing allegations. “This is a price Pakistan have to pay for the inactivity by the PCB,” Abassi said. “I see very grave results for this.”

Former PCB chairman Tauqir Zia, who implemented a match-fixing inquiry in 2000 which handed life bans to Salim Malik and Ata-ur Rehman, as well as fining six other players, said the trio faced possible imprisonment if convicted.

“I think the players are now in a mire,even if they get away with lighter punishments from the ICC this latest CPS casecan put them behind the bars,” said Zia. A constitutional and legal expert, Farogh Naseem, said the Pakistani government should help the players, who are due in court on March 17.

“I think first of all they need to get their bail and then I think Pakistan government should help them as they are Pakistani players,” Nasimsaid.

The Pakistan trio, who have all repeatedly denied wrongdoing, are currently provisionally suspended from international cricket.