Jailed Bob Hasan suspended from IOC

Jailed Bob Hasan suspended from IOC

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP): Mohamad "Bob" Hasan, who is serving a six-year jail term in Indonesia on corruption charges, was suspended Tuesday as a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The IOC executive board announced the sanction after receiving a recommendation from its ethics commission.

Pending further investigation, Hasan could face expulsion from the IOC at its session in Moscow in July, IOC director general Francois Carrard said.

Hasan, a business partner of former Indonesian strongman Soeharto, has been an IOC member since 1994.

In February, a Jakarta appeal court sentenced Hasan to six years in jail for his role in a multi-million dollar scam involving a forest mapping project in the early 1990s.

During the Soeharto era, Hasan became one of Indonesia's richest tycoons.

Hasan was recently transferred from a Jakarta jail to a notorious prison island Nusa Kambangan in Central Java.

Francois Werner, the ethics commission's chief investigator in the case, said he would travel to Indonesia if necessary to gather further information.

"We need to make further inquiries to find out what he has done and why he has done it," he said.

A final report on the case is expected to be presented to the IOC at its July 9 to July 16 meeting in Moscow. If there is a recommendation for expulsion, it would require a two-thirds vote of the full IOC membership to oust Hasan.

It would be the first expulsion since 1999, when six members were kicked out in connection with the Salt Lake City vote-buying scandal.

The ethics commission was set up following the scandal.

Carrard said the executive board decided Tuesday to set up a foundation to secure the full independence of the ethics panel.

The IOC, which allocated 4 million Swiss francs (US$2.3 million) to the project, will have one representative on the 10- person board.