Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB)spokesman Nadeem Sawar said that Hameed had been banned from first-class competition and fined 300,000 rupees (about 3,500 US dollars) "for his spot-fixing allegations against some national players in a newspaper interview last year".

He did not specify the length of the ban.

Two days after three Pakistani players Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Aamer were accused of spot-fixing in the Lord's Test by British tabloid the News of the World, Hameed told an undercover reporter that his team-mates had been involved in fixing for years.

The three players received bans of between five and 10 years from the International Cricket Council's anti-corruption tribunal earlier this month.

They also face criminal prosecution in Britain and are due to appear in a London court on March 17.

Hameed, 32, has played 25 Tests and 56 one-day matches for Pakistan in a career that began in 2003, but has not been selected since the Lord's Test.

He later claimed that he was trapped into the interview, which was recorded secretly, and also lodged a complaint against the newspaper in Britain.