FIFA Drops Russian Football Team, Clubs From Its Events

Following the initial decisions adopted by the FIFA Council and the UEFA Executive Committee, which envisaged the adoption of additional measures, FIFA and UEFA on Monday decided together that all Russian teams, whether national representative teams or club teams, shall be suspended from participation in both FIFA and UEFA competitions until further notice.

These decisions were adopted by the Bureau of the FIFA Council and the Executive Committee of UEFA, respectively the highest decision-making bodies of both institutions on such urgent matters.

“Football is fully united here and in full solidarity with all the people affected in Ukraine. Both Presidents hope that the situation in Ukraine will improve significantly and rapidly so that football can again be a vector for unity and peace amongst people,” the joint statement by UEFA and FIFA added.

Earlier in the day, in order to protect the integrity of global sports competitions and for the safety of all the participants, the IOC EB recommended that the International Sports Federations and sports event organisers not invite or allow the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials in international competitions.

“The IOC EB based on the exceptional circumstances of the situation and considering the extremely grave violation of the Olympic Truce and other violations of the Olympic Charter by the Russian government in the past, taken the ad hoc decision to withdraw the Olympic Order from all persons who currently have an important function in the government of the Russian Federation or other government-related high-ranking position, including the following: Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation (Gold, 2001), Dmitry Chernyshenko, Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation (Gold, 2014), and Dmitry Kozak, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office (Gold, 2014),” a statement said. (ANI)