By Andrew Warshaw
May 12 – World Cup qualifiers with a high risk of racist incidents are to be targeted by FIFA as it steps up the fight against discrimination. A new monitoring system of specialists will be put in place both during the 2018 qualifying competition, which covers some 900 games globally, and the finals themselves in Russia.
The observers, placed strategically at matches without the countries concerned being notified in advance, will be highly trained in terms of language and understanding local cultures to spot key incidents and submit any evidence within 24 hours to FIFA which will then analyse the information and decide whether to impose disciplinary sanctions. For severe cases, penalties could include points deductions or even the possibility of being expelled from the competition.
FIFA president Sepp Blatter has already called for more severe sanctions than just warnings and fines to be imposed in order to deal with an alarming resurgence of racism.
Some 200 racist incidents were committed by Russian fans between 2012 and 2014 according to a recent report by the Sova Center, a Moscow-based group. Significantly, Russia as World Cup hosts are not involved in qualifying but Federico Addiechi, FIFA’s head of sustainability, revealed the country could still be covered by the so-called Anti-Discrimination Monitoring System during friendly matches without prior notification.
Addiechi was one of a number of experts present at the launch of the initiative at Wembley stadium today. The project follows recommendations of the FIFA anti-discrimination taskforce set up in 2013 and headed by CONCACAF president Jeffrey Webb and is being implemented in collaboration with the European anti-discrimination body Fare.
“We, as an international organization, have responsibilities beyond just organizing the World Cup,” said Addiechi. “We decided it was important to have a mechanism that enables our disciplinary committee to get the necessary evidence when such cases arise – and be able to act. The objective is to have a permanent presence at matches that are considered at risk from a discrimination standpoint.”
Manchester City midfielder Yaya Toure, who has been subject to racist abuse on a number of occasions – not least when he played in Russia – endorsed the new initiative, saying far more had still to be done to tackle racism.
“I’m very satisfied to see that FIFA is taking this issue very seriously and putting in place concrete measures to stop behaviour which goes against the spirit of our sport,” Toure told reporters.
Fare’s executive director Piara Power, a member of the FIFA Taskforce, said there was now greater recognition of the need to tackle discrimination.
“This collaboration …marks a milestone in the fight against discrimination in football,” said Power, in terms of “beginning the process of flying the flag that says we can truly implement a zero tolerance-type policy.”
“We are bringing our experience and know-how in identifying matchday issues and will work with leading experts across the world to ensure that football’s flagship event shows that football does not have to be associated with issues of discrimination or exclusion.”
“We anticipate that the biggest issues will remain in Europe and Latin America but that’s not to say it won’t happen in CONCACAF, Asia or Africa. Associations could be banned or asked to play behind closed doors. There will be some pain but there is a realization that without that pain, people will not really understand how they should be tackling these issues.”
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