By Paul Nicholson and Andrew Warshaw
March 27 – Response to US senators Mark Kirk
and Dan Coats demands to FIFA to ban Russia from World Cup 2014 and strip them of hosting rights of the World Cup 2018 has been dismissive, if not ridiculing. And UEFA president Michel Platini is “fed up”.
The US senators wrote to FIFA president Sepp Blatter March 6 calling for an emergency FIFA session saying that a ” more deserving World Cup 2018 bid should be re-considered instead”, and that the right to participate
When asked for his position on the issue by INSIDEworldfootball at the UEFA Congress in Astana, Kazakhstan, Platini said he was starting to get “fed up” with politicians and that “politicians should take care of politics”.
“With respect to requests from politicians, they are always asking about boycotting and I’m starting to get fed up with this,” said Platini.
“People are never interested in the sport proper, the only thing that counts is that as soon as there is a demonstration, ‘oh lets have a boycott’. I remember that politicians boycotted Ukraine during the euros but during the final, didn’t I see the prime ministers of Spain and Italy there?
“It always seems to be sport. It’s easy for senators to do that. In Argentina when I played in the World Cup, certain intellectuals asked us to boycott the event. I’m sorry but politicians should take care of politics but sport should bring people together and be a place for brotherhood. The people don’t ask for boycotts, its always the politicians. Far better in my opinion to go there and express your opinion.”
Russia, a country not always renowned for its humour, responded somewhat tongue-in-cheek with deputies from the Russian State Duma, from the United Russia and Fair Russia parties, asking for FIFA to revoke the membership of the USA.
Aleksandr Sidyakin and Mikhail Markelov wrote asking for the USA men’s football team to be disqualified from the 2014 World Cup and for their membership of the organisation to be terminated. “It’s an eye for an eye, a ball for a ball. Don’t let the USA take part in the 2014 World Cup! End their membership of FIFA”, Sidyakin wrote on his twitter page.
The Americans’ letter to FIFA said: “According to Article 3 of the FIFA Statutes: “[d]iscrimination of any kind against a country, private person or group of people on account of ethnic origin, gender, language, religion, politics or any other reason is strictly prohibited and punishable by suspension or expulsion.”
“As you know, there is ample precedent for suspending or expelling a FIFA member, such as when FIFA denied the then-Yugoslavia the right to participate in both the 1992 European Championship and the 1994 World Cup.”
Many have subsequently commented that the US should hence be treated in the same and have their membership of FIFA revoked for their own human rights records in various Arab nations.
The US senators’ letter, timed as it was, came at a time when American pressure from different sources was directed at FIFA to reopen the World Cup bidding process for 2022 in particular. Questions were also asked whether there was a conflict of interest with FIFA’s chief ethics investigator, Michael Garcia, in investigating a bid win (2022) which if overturned would most likely benefit his home country, as well a bid (2018) which was won a country that is in a deep political and ideological conflict with his own and who has banned him entry for previous actions in a US government role against Russian nationals.
While much of it is an undoubtedly posturing, the old east-west geo-political battle ground has been drawn again in football as it has been in past Olympics.
Contact the writer of this story at paul,moc.l1734874594labto1734874594ofdlr1734874594owedi1734874594sni@n1734874594osloh1734874594cin1734874594