Several members of Fifa’s ruling council have called on the football body’s ethics committee to demand the evidence behind allegations that the Qatar 2022 World Cup bid ran a secret campaign to sabotage their rivals for the tournament.

A report on Sunday exposed documents allegedly passed by a whistleblower who worked with the Qatar bid. It claimed that bid team used a PR agency and former CIA operatives to disseminate fake propaganda about its main competitors, the United States and Australia, in a flagrant breach of the rules set down for bidding countries by football’s world governing body.

Qatar beat rival bids from the the United States, Australia, South Korea and Japan to win the right to host the competition eight years ago, and has faced questions over its shock win in the race to stage the even ever since.

The alleged smears against rival bidders reportedly involved recruiting prominent figures to criticise the bids in their own countries, thus giving the impression they lacked support at home.

The Telegraph contacted several members of Fifa’s ruling council for comment on the Sunday Times story. Several said the governing body or its quasi-independent ethics committee should ask to see evidence of the newspaper’s claims, amid calls in Westminster for an “independent investigation”.