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Former UEFA president, Michel Platini was released from custody in the early hours of Wednesday after being questioned as part of a corruption investigation into the awarding of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.
Platini said he was expecting to be questioned as a witness as he was 18 months ago and was ‘hurt’ when he was taken into custody instead.
‘It hurts. It hurts for everything I can think of, everything I’ve done. It hurts, it hurts. But after all, they did their job and then we tried to answer all the questions,’ he said.
The former star midfielder for France and Juventus said investigators quizzed him about an array of tournaments, including the 2016 European Championship, the World Cups in Russia in 2018 and in Qatar in 2022.
Platini had a hand in deciding where these tournaments would be played as the president of UEFA and as a vice-president at world soccer governing body FIFA.
The investigators also asked about French club Paris Saint-Germain, which was bought by Qatar in 2011.
Investigators are thought to be particularly interested in a lunch that Platini attended in 2010 with then-President Nicolas Sarkozy, the Emir of Qatar and his foreign minister shortly before the 2022 World Cup was awarded.
William Bourdon, Platini’s lawyer, said his client was innocent of all charges and that he had been questioned on ‘technical grounds.’
