US sport suffers new 'sex abuse' blow

American college sports - a multi-million dollar industry - have been rocked by another sex scandal as New York's Syracuse University fired an assistant basketball coach over allegations that he sexually molested boys.

A statement by the university said Bernie Fine, 65, had been sacked on the instigation of chancellor Nancy Cantor. Fine had been on "administrative leave" for 11 days.

A grand jury is investigating claims that he molested a former ball boy, now 39, and at least one other boy, now 45, when they were juveniles. The university first investigated and dismissed the allegations in 2005. Fine has called the accusations "patently false".

The firing comes in the wake of allegations of abuse and possible cover-ups at Penn State, where a former assistant football coach faces 40 sex abuse charges and his boss - top coach Joe Paterno - was fired for failing to tell police about the allegations of abuse when they learned of it years earlier.

Syracuse is the third major American university to disclose alleged abuse since the college year began. South Carolina military college The Citadel also said it had failed to tell police about a student accused of inappropriate behaviour with children at a college summer camp in 2007.