Tweet
From the BBC website:
Former Renault team boss Flavio Briatore is to launch legal proceedings against motorsport's governing body the FIA to overturn a ban imposed on him.
The Italian was penalised for his role in Renault's attempt to fix last year's Singapore Grand Prix by asking driver Nelson Piquet Jr to crash deliberately.
The FIA has indefinitely banned Briatore from events it sanctions and forbade him from managing drivers.
Briatore said the "FIA has been used as a tool to exact vengeance on one man".
In a statement, the 59-year-old Italian described the penalty against him as a "legal absurdity", adding: "I have every confidence that the French courts will resolve the matter justly and impartially".
The FIA did not punish Renault after it decided not to contest the charges of fixing the race.
Piquet's crash led to a safety car period, which promoted his team-mate Fernando Alonso to a position from which the Spaniard was able to win the race despite starting 15th on the grid.
An internal investigation by Renault found Briatore and former engineering director Pat Symonds guilty of organising the fixing attempt.
The FIA gave Renault a ban from F1, suspended for two years, and instead decided to punish Briatore and Symonds, who has been banned from FIA-sanctioned events for five years.
Briatore's statement accused the FIA of a "deliberate breach of the rights of the defence", a "breach of the rules of natural justice" and a "manifest excess and abuse of power".
It added that: "Flavio Briatore intends to obtain an order from the court quashing the FIA's decision insofar as it relates to him, together with an order, subject to a penalty for non-compliance, requiring the Federation to withdraw any penalty imposed on him. He is also seeking damages and official publication of the court's decision."
The FIA tried to impose a similar ban on the two men at the heart of the McLaren spy scandal in 2007, only for president Max Mosley to later admit that its lawyers had advised him the ban was probably not enforceable.
Former Renault team boss Flavio Briatore is to launch legal proceedings against motorsport's governing body the FIA to overturn a ban imposed on him.
The Italian was penalised for his role in Renault's attempt to fix last year's Singapore Grand Prix by asking driver Nelson Piquet Jr to crash deliberately.
The FIA has indefinitely banned Briatore from events it sanctions and forbade him from managing drivers.
Briatore said the "FIA has been used as a tool to exact vengeance on one man".
In a statement, the 59-year-old Italian described the penalty against him as a "legal absurdity", adding: "I have every confidence that the French courts will resolve the matter justly and impartially".
The FIA did not punish Renault after it decided not to contest the charges of fixing the race.
Piquet's crash led to a safety car period, which promoted his team-mate Fernando Alonso to a position from which the Spaniard was able to win the race despite starting 15th on the grid.
An internal investigation by Renault found Briatore and former engineering director Pat Symonds guilty of organising the fixing attempt.
The FIA gave Renault a ban from F1, suspended for two years, and instead decided to punish Briatore and Symonds, who has been banned from FIA-sanctioned events for five years.
Briatore's statement accused the FIA of a "deliberate breach of the rights of the defence", a "breach of the rules of natural justice" and a "manifest excess and abuse of power".
It added that: "Flavio Briatore intends to obtain an order from the court quashing the FIA's decision insofar as it relates to him, together with an order, subject to a penalty for non-compliance, requiring the Federation to withdraw any penalty imposed on him. He is also seeking damages and official publication of the court's decision."
The FIA tried to impose a similar ban on the two men at the heart of the McLaren spy scandal in 2007, only for president Max Mosley to later admit that its lawyers had advised him the ban was probably not enforceable.
Comment