The IOC's ruling Executive Committee are expected to listen to a report from its Ethics Commission which will recommend that Lee, the former chairman of Samsung, is allowed to resume the Olympic role he voluntarily removed himself from when the scandal broke in 2008.

That was after he was accused of failing to pay $39 million (£24 million) in taxes, following allegations he hid money in accounts held under the names of aides.

Lee was found guilty in July 2008 and given the biggest fine in South Korean history along with a three-year suspended prison sentence.

But in December he was controversially given a Presidential pardon following pressure from supporters who wanted him to lead Pyeongchang's bid to host the 2018 Winter Olympics amid fears that lack of South Korean influence among the IOC membership threatened to undermine it.

It was the second Presidential pardon that Lee had been given.

In 1997, a year after becoming a member of the IOC, he was pardoned of bribery charges.

Lee's reinstatement would follow the pattern of previous IOC ethics cases.

France's Guy Drut was provisionally suspended as a member in 2005 after being convicted in a party-financing trial.

But he was reinstated a year later after being pardoned by then French President Jacques Chirac.

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