ROME, February 1 - RAPSI. Legendary soccer player Diego Maradona was cleared of tax evasion charges in Italy, the Ansa news agency quoted his lawyer Angelo Pisani as saying on Friday.

"He has finally been liberated from this fiscal nightmare and the accusations that he faced," Pisani said, adding that Maradona plans to sue the Italian authorities for 40 million euro in damages - the same amount that they claimed he owed in taxes.

His trial began in Naples in January 2012. The Italian tax authorities accused the international soccer legend of accumulating a debt while playing for a local club in the 1980s. As a result, they said he owed 40 million euro in back taxes and fines.

Maradona's attorneys later succeeded in cutting the amount to 34.2 million euro.

The Naples Tax Commission's decision should resolve the tangled relations between the player and the tax authorities, which resulted in several arrests and the confiscation of Maradona's personal effects in Italy.

The most recent incident in the tax battle took place in September 2009, when the Financial Guard confiscated his diamond earring during a vacation in Merano and auctioned it for 25,000 euro.