Milan: Inter Milan were declared Serie A champions on Wednesday after a sports tribunal stripped Juventus of the title in Italy’s match fixing-scandal. The Italian soccer federation said the title was assigned to Inter because they were the highest ranking team in the standings which had not been punished in the case (briefly reported in Thursday’s Late City edition).

Inter finished third in the 2005-2006 season, behind Juventus and AC Milan.

Juventus were relegated to Serie B and stripped of the top-flight title, while AC Milan were docked 30 points for the past season. An appeals court Tuesday also upheld a decision by a lower sports court to strip Juventus of the 2004-2005 league title. That title will remain vacant, the soccer federation said.

Despite the final appeals rulings in the case, Juventus, Lazio and Fiorentina say they will continue to fight the penalties they received.

Juventus plan to go to court to contest their relegation. “We absolutely cannot accept this sentence,” Juventus president Giovanni Cobolli Gigli said. “We will pursue our appeal through all possible courts. As long as justice has not been served, I can make assurances that we will never stop.”

AC Milan were reinstated to the Champion’s League and had their point penalty for next season reduced from 15 to 8.

However, Uefa has delayed a decision until next week on whether to allow Milan to participate in this season’s Champions League.

European soccer’s governing body will make a decision by next Wednesday, August 2, Uefa said after a meeting of it emergency panel on Thursday. The draw for the third qualifying round takes place on Friday and Milan will be included on a provisional basis, Uefa said.

“As far as the position of AC Milan is concerned, the Panel took note of a report submitted by the Uefa Chief Disciplinary Inspector on the question whether it would be appropriate, due to the particular circumstances, to admit AC Milan to the 2006-07 Uefa club competitions,” Uefa said in a statement.

“Following this report, the Emergency Panel has decided to further examine whether to admit AC Milan to the 2006-07 UEFA club competitions. (Agencies)