Paul
Goble
Staunton, June 5 – Even before the
upcoming trials of former FIFA staffers confirm as seems likely that Moscow corruptly
secured the hosting of the 2018 World Cup, a finding that would make it
unthinkable to allow the competition to occur in Russia, there are already
three compelling reasons why the international community should insist it be
shifted to another venue.
Two are offered in a commentary
today by Vladimir Ogryzko, a former Ukrainian foreign minister, and the third
is provided in a backhanded way by FIFA itself (nv.ua/opinion/ogryzko/otmena-chm-2018-kak-politicheskaya-poshchechina-kremlyu-52156.html
and nazaccent.ru/content/16300-predstaviteli-fifa-priznali-edinichnyj-harakter-rasistskih.html).
First of all, as Ogryzko points out,
taking the games away from Russia would give Vladimir Putin a major publicity
defeat and prevent him from using the World Cup as he did the Sochi Olympiad to
boost his standing in the world. It
would thus represent a continuation of the international condemnation and isolation
of the Kremlin since its invasion of Ukraine.
Second, he says, taking the
competition away from Russia would represent an extension of the West’s
sanctions regime against Moscow for its actions in Ukraine by depriving it of the
income it might otherwise get. Thus, it would represent “an additional economic
sanction,” one that might have a positive impact.
And third, this week FIFA officials
attempted to play down the amount of racist violence by Russian fans by
suggesting that the Russian government was working hard to rein in such
manifestations and that other soccer countries have an even worse record with
regard to actions driven by ethnic and religious hatred.
But that FIFA effort has had the effect
of calling attention to the amount of soccer violence and to the fact that
several black soccer players have already announced they will not take part in the
World Cup if it is held in Russia because of fears for their personal security
(nazaccent.ru/content/15399-inspektor-po-antirasizmu-rfs-nazval-problemu.html).
That protest,
three years in advance of the competition, prompted Russian President Vladimir
Putin to decalare that holding the World Cup competition in Russia would help
the country fight racism, a declaration almost as likely to be true as his
claims that there are no Russian troops fighting in Ukraine.
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