Six top Olympic officials from four countries have been implicated in the supplying of black market tickets for the London Games, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said.

The illegal sale of tickets for the 2012 Games was initially uncovered by a British newspaper mid-June. It handed its  findings to the IOC ethics commission.

The IOC's report released last night mentioned six people including Greek National Olympic Committee (NOC) president Spyros Capralos and his marketing chief Nicole Avramidou of breaching the IOC's code of conduct.

Malta's NOC president Lino Farrugia Sacco and secretary general Joe Cassar were also implicated along with Serbia's NOC president Djordje Visacki and Lithuanian secretary general Vytautas Zubernis.

(The Maltese officials have persistently denied any wrongdoing.)

The IOC said however that the six could not be sanctioned under their rules.

"The scope of the competence of the ethics code of the IOC allows the IOC to take an action against the body of the National committee, but for reasons due to legal issues, we have no authority on the people themself," explained IOC president Jacques Rogge.

"We think it could be changed in the ethics code but we have to respect the restrictions of the rules that we have set."

The IOC urged the national Olympic committees and indiviudals concerned "to take the appropriate measures" or face the possibility of having their accreditation for the Olympic Games or other related events refused.

Meanwhile the IOC promised to overhaul their system of allocating tickets for the 2016 Rio Games to avoid a repeat of the London situation.

MALTA SECTION

In its reference to Malta, the IOC report says:

"With regard to the NOC of Malta,

a) Mr Lino Farrugia, President of the Maltese NOC:

After taking cognisance of all the evidence and his observations, the Commission observes that, by agreeing to take part, with the NOC Secretary General, in a discussion concerning the ATR contract for the Games in Sochi, when it was apparent that his interlocutors seemed to be looking for ways to circumvent the official mechanism, Mr Farrugia allowed the journalists to prove their point.

b) Mr Joe Cassar, Secretary General of the Maltese NOC:

After taking cognisance of all the evidence and his observations, the Commission observes that, by agreeing to discuss the ATR contract for the Games in Sochi when his interlocutors were clearly looking for ways to circumvent the official mechanism and knowing that some of the tickets could be sold in the Middle East; and finally by explaining which means could be used to get around the mechanism, Mr Joe Cassar helped to prove the point being made by the journalists, namely that the sports world and those who work with it are prepared to violate the rules. As a result, Mr Joe Cassar helped the reputation of the Olympic Movement to be tarnished."