ICC launches appeal for information on suspected fixer Aneel Munawar
Aneel Munawar, an alleged match-fixer from Mumbai, is the subject of the ICC ACU's investigation.

As part of an extensive investigation by the its Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU), the International Cricket Council (ICC) on Tuesday launched an appeal to identify the whereabout of the remaining suspected match-fixer, Aneel Munawar, who in an Al-Jazeera documentary released earlier this year claims that he has been involving in match-fixing for six to seven years .

Al-Jazeera in May released a documentary in which a 2017 Test match between India and Australia in Ranchi was brought into question for illegal activity, and in the footage it was claimed that two unnamed Australian batsmen were paid to bat slowly during a particular passage of play. Also in the video, Munawar is shown several times, most prominently when photographed standing just metres away from two then-current England cricketers and then former West Indies captain Darren Sammy all during the 2012 ICC World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka.

Munawar was identified by Indian intelligence sources as working for the D-Company crime syndicate, according to the Al-Jazeera document.

In a press release today, the ICC ACU s general manager Alex Marshall said: We have identified every other person in the original documentary and have spoken to a number of them in connection with match fixing, including those who are not deemed to be participants under our Anti-Corruption Code. However the true identity of Aneel Munawar remains a mystery. He plays a significant role in the programme, yet enquiries with law enforcement and immigration sources have not identified or located him.


As per the ICC, Al-Jazeera has not been cooperative, but on its own account cricket s governing body has made good progress in identifying people of significant interest including people already of interest to the ACU . According to Tuesday s statement, the ACU has been able to discount several of the claims made in the Al-Jazeera documentary and that it will provide a comprehensive update once at the end of its investigation.

We are aware that there is a second documentary in the offing, this time based on historical recordings between a fixer, suspected to be Munawar and bookies in India, said Marshall. As with the first programme, we will investigate any claims made in a full and thorough manner and we take any allegations of corruption, historical or contemporary, extremely seriously. Based on what we already know, we have engaged the services of an independent betting analysis company to examine the claims made about particular matches.


Soon after the Al-Jazeera document was released, Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland dismissed its claims as lacking credible evidence in regards to Australia cricketers, and the board quickly asked Al Jazeera to submit evidence to the ICC’s anti-corruption investigators.