Briatore And Fia Agree 2013 Return

Former Renault team principal Flavio Briatore cannot return to F1 until 2013 after resolving his legal case with motorsport’s governing body the FIA.

Briatore had a lifetime ban for his role in Nelson Piquet Jr’s deliberate crash at the 2008 Sinagpore Grand Prix quashed by a French court in January.

The FIA launched an appeal against the ruling, but has now reached an out-of-court settlement with the Italian.

The FIA says it has drawn a line under the saga while Briatore has apologised.

Former Renault engineering director Pat Symonds, who had his five-year ban overturned by the French court, also expressed his regrets for deliberately asking Piquet Jr to crash to help his team-mate Fernando Alonso win the race in September 2008.

The FIA statement read: ‘They have undertaken to abstain from having any operational role in Formula 1 until 31 December 2012, as well as in all the other competitions registered on the FIA calendars until the end of the 2011 sporting season.

‘They have also abandoned all publicity and financial measures resulting from the judgment of 5 January 2010, as well as any further action against the FIA on the subject of this affair.

‘In return, they have asked the FIA to abandon the ongoing appeal procedure, but without the FIA recognising the validity of the criticisms levelled against the WMSC’s decision of 21 September 2009, as well as to waive the right to bring any new proceedings against them on the subject of this affair.’

Briatore won his case at the start of the year in France’s Tribunal de Grande Instance on the grounds that former FIA president, Max Mosley, who had presided over the hearing that banned him, had acted as prosecutor, judge and jury.

Briatore had also been seeking €1m in compensation but was awarded damages of €20,000 while Symonds given €5,000.