The International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS) has partnered with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) to host around 100 government officials, technical experts and sports leaders at a special technical meeting in Doha during the first half of 2015. The meeting will discuss how to implement the recommendations on combating the manipulation of sports competitions as outlined in the Declaration of Berlin, adopted by European sports ministers (MINEPS V) in May 2013.

The Declaration sought to coordinate efforts on combating the manipulation of sports competitions, raise public awareness of the problem, promote research into it, ensure that tools are in place to fight it (including the consideration of criminal sanctions), support the Council of Europe in its recently-adopted International Convention on the Manipulation of Sports Competitions, ensure that sport effectively polices the problem through effective regulations, education, ombudsmen, codes of conduct, amnesties and more.

As part of this agreement, the ICSS hosted a closed-door meeting at Securing Sport 2014 on sporting corruption. The ICSS said that the meeting highlighted the need for:

• implementation of education initiatives;
• Support, including the provision of external expertise and best practice models, countries and regions to assist them in creating national integrity platforms; and
• Cross-institutional and regional collaboration in creating work programmes to preserve the integrity of sport.

“This special ministerial forum was another important step in engaging key countries and regions, international experts and sport ministers and ensuring that protecting the integrity of sport continues to stay high on the agenda”, said ICSS President Mohammed Hanzab at the Securing Sport conference, when announcing the agreement. “We are all custodians of sport and we owe it to every athlete and sport fan to protect its integrity and credibility so we can nurture the next generation of sport’s leaders”.