Gian Carlo Minardi♏ has said that the manner of Flavio Briatore's public🐽 ousting from the motorsport world smacked of a crusade against the flamboyant Italian.

The former F1 team owner admitted that it was 'not easy to issue statements on a complex subject matter, by reading news only ♚from the press', accepting that it would be possible to jump to the wrong conclusion, but insisted that, in his opinion, the judicial procedure was heavy-handed.

"I was very surprꦇised and shocked by the treatment that has been reserved for Flavi🐓o Briatore as, in my opinion, it should not be a World Council that issues this ruling, but rather a sporting justice. The decision was taken in a few minutes and we have had people questioning the mysterious [Witness X]. It seemed more of a manhunt, to strike and remove Briatore, rather than really try to find out how the events went. It seems pure fiction to organise such a scam."

Minardi also had harsh words for Nelson Piquet Jr who, despite b💃eing the driver who deliberately crashed his car to bring out a caution period that helped Renault team-mate Fernando Alonso win the 𝓀race, was granted immunity by the FIA for spilling the beans.

"It's like a killer, after a killing s൩omeone, being offered freedom in exchange ൩for his testimony," Minardi said, "At this point, Piquet will have certainly a future in F1 because he has proven not to believe in its potential and not to have a personality.

"In my career, ꦿit never so much crossed my mind to give a set of tyres that are under-perforꦆming to one of my drivers to try to encourage his partner, so imagine voluntarily going into a wall."

Minardi, who sold his team to Paul Stoddart in 2000, believes that Briatore is unlikely to simply accept his fate, and it appeܫars that the Ital✅ian will indeed press ahead with his bid to overturn the life ban he was handed by the FIA at the start of the week.

"In the end, I will win and, you will see, we will have a big party," he told Italy's La Repubblica "It will be well organised and we'll 🔯invite everyone who has stayed close to me in these difficult times.

"Look at the verdict the FIA pu꧂t online on Tuesday - it's not about me. I've been betrayed by my own world, [but] I will talk only at the right time - assuming they let me talk!"