Sepp Blatter will be warned that he could yet face action from Swiss prosecutors when the country's Attorney General breaks his silence about his criminal inquiry into the award of the next two World Cups this morning (Wednesday).
Michael Lauber is expected to reiterate that Fifa's president is not -presently under investigation fol-lowing a second raid on the governing body's headquarters last week, when further data was seized relating to the discredited bidding process.
However, Switzerland's top prosecutor will announce at a press conference that he is now examining such a mountain of evidence that he cannot rule out proceedings being opened against any individual.
That includes Blatter, who is said to be a target for the separate FBI-led investigation into the corruption scandal that culminated in his resignation a fortnight ago.
Andre Marty, the head of communications for the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland, said: "Depending on information, depending on analysis of documents, depending on -information coming in from abroad, it's way too early to exclude or to include specific persons from these criminal pro-ceedings.
"Imagine a whistleblower pops up. Imagine one of the files our guys are analysing now comes up with whatever kind of financial transaction. Imagine the president turns himself in to avoid whatever other measures. It's not as if the Office of the Attorney General would be afraid of something like that."
Lauber should also reveal whether Blatter, 79, has already been interviewed as a witness or, if not, if and when that might take place.
The Swiss, who denies any wrongdoing, was not among the 10 Fifa executives sought for questioning when the Attorney General opened criminal proceedings three weeks ago. Marty suggested that the investigation could run and run, pointing out that the FBI took years to bring charges in its own investigation into Fifa corruption.
"There are lots of bank documents that are of interest, there is lots of data seized," he said. "There is a variety of basic information sources. It's not as if people are not willing to investigate but it's simply that the sheer size of the data. And comparing also to the American investigation, just remember we opened this investigation a few months ago."
That was at the behest of Fifa, which submitted the findings of its own internal investigation conducted by Michael J Garcia.
Lauber has been cooperating with his American counterpart, Loretta Lynch, but Marty warned that did not extend to sharing the Garcia report with the FBI, and that the same would apply with the UK's Serious Fraud Office. "You can't just deliver them the Garcia report, for example," he said. "They can't just deliver their evidence to us."
Among the documents obtained by Lauber are those relating to money paid for a friendly between Brazil and Argentina in Qatar three weeks before the tiny Middle Eastern country was awarded the 2022 World Cup.
Meanwhile, Fifa yesterday (Tuesday) hit out at the decision by those in charge of the Nobel Peace Prize to terminate its relationship with the beleaguered world governing body. The Nobel Peace Centre and Fifa have been partners in Blatter's cherished 'Handshake for Peace' initiative between team captains and officials since 2012. "Fifa is reluctant to accept this unilateral approach on what is a joint initiative between the football community and the Nobel Peace Centre," Fifa said in a statement.
