It’s not just Fifa – now former athletics kingpin Lamine Diack is under investigation for corruption and money laundering

Lamine Diack, the former head of world athletics, has been placed under formal investigation in France on suspicion of corruption and money laundering following a complaint from the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada).

The inquiry, confirmed by the French financial prosecutor’s office on Wednesday, comes at a time when the image of world sport’s governing bodies is under serious scrutiny. There is a large-scale corruption investigation at soccer’s Fifa while athletics is fighting a desperate public relations rearguard battle in the face of continual doping issues.

According to French news channel iTELE, the investigation is focused on suspicions that payments were made in return for not revealing widespread doping of Russian athletes.

The prosecutor’s office did not confirm that but said its investigation started when the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) alerted it to "acts of corruption and laundering involving members of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF)."

Wada said it would hold a press conference on Monday to address certain findings of its own investigation and added in a statement: "These [French] investigations are a result of information passed on by Wada’s Independent Commission [IC] to the relevant authorities."

The press conference will exclude "matters now under police investigation, which are expected to be available before the end of the year," Wada said in a later statement.