Muscat: The International Cricket Council (ICC) has suspended Oman’s Yousef Abdulrahim Al Balushi with immediate effect for breaching cricket’s anti-corruption rules, the governing body said on Thursday. 

ICC’s anti-corruption unit (ACU) filed the charges for allegedly indulging in corrupt practice during the 2019 T20 World Cup Qualifier, played in the UAE.

Al Balushi who is currently not an active player was last named among the reserves for 2016 T20 World Cup. The ACU has also filed charges against Al Balushi for match fixing. 

Breach of Article 2.1.1 – being party to an agreement or effort to fix or contrive in any way the result, progress, conduct or any other aspect of matches in the ICC World T20 Qualifiers 2019.

Breach of Article 2.1.4 – Attempting to solicit, induce, entice, persuade, encourage or intentionally facilitate a Participant to breach Article 2.1.

Breach of Article 2.4.4 – failing to report the approaches or invitations that you received from three different individuals to be a party to an agreement or effort to fix matches in the ICC World T20 Qualifiers 2019.

Breach of Article 2.4.7 – Obstructing or delaying an investigation carried out by the ACU in relation to possible Corrupt Conduct under the Code, including by concealing or tampering with information that may be relevant to that investigation and/or that may be evidence of or lead to the discovery of evidence of Corrupt Conduct under the Code. 

Al Balushi has 14 days to respond to the charges. “The ICC will not make any further comment in respect of these charges at this stage,” ICC said in the statement.