Maradona candidate for FIFA presidency

Argentine football player and coach Diego Maradona says he will run for the presidency of the International Federation of Association Footbal (FIFA), a journalist close to the star says.

“He told me he would be a candidate for president of FIFA and authorized me to communicate it,” Uruguayan journalist Victor Hugo Morales tweeted.

Maradona has been a harsh critic of incumbent FIFA president, 79-year-old Swiss Sepp Blatter. Blatter is under considerable pressure from investigations into claims of corruption by the FBI and Swiss authorities.

The scandal, which has already led to charges against 18 senior FIFA officials, has forced Blatter to announce he would resign soon. He made the announcement just days after defiantly winning his fifth term as FIFA president in late May.

Blatter will stay acting president until a successor is chosen between December 2015 and March 2016 – and Diego Maradona could be that successor.

Maradona is one of the most controversial figures in the history of football. The 54-year-old has played for seven football clubs and Argentina’s national team.

He was also addicted to cocaine for almost two decades, which had him suspended for 15 months in 1991 after he failed a drug test. He overcame the addiction in 2005, but it caused him heart problems.

After retiring from the field, he managed several football teams, including Argentina’s national squad. His latest job was managing the Dubai-based club Al Wasl.

With Maradona as FIFA-president the organization will probably focus on being much more anti-European. Global soccer has been one of the most effective vehicles to promote multiculturlism.

Washington politicizes soccer

Washington’s attack on world soccer is following the script of Washington’s attack on the Russian-hosted Sochi Olympics. The difference is that Washington couldn’t stop the Olympics from being held in Sochi, and was limited to scaring off westerners with lies and propaganda.

In the current scandal orchestrated by Washington, Washington intends to use its takeover of FIFA to renege on FIFA’s decision that Russia host the next World Cup.

This is part of Washington’s agenda of isolating Russia from the World.

This Washington-orchestrated scandal stinks to high heaven. It seems obvious that the FIFA officials have been arrested for political reasons and that the recently overwhelmingly-reelected FIFA president, Sepp Blatter, was forced to resign by Washington’s threats to indict him as well. This can happen because Washington no longer is subject to the rule of law. In Washington’s hands, law is a weapon that is used against everyone, every organization, and every country that takes a position independent of Washington.

This clears the deck for Washington and its British lapdog to take over FIFA, which henceforth will be used to reward countries that comply with Washington’s foreign policy and to punish those who pursue an independent foreign policy.

The only hope for South America, Asia, and Russia is to form their own World Cup and turn their backs on the corrupt West.

It is astonishing that Russia, Asia, and South America so much desire to be part of the corrupt and immoral Western world. Why do countries wish to be associated with evil? Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, and perhaps Argentina and Brazil have learned that being in the Western orbit means putting their country under Washington’s control.

Putin, Lavrov, and China’s leaders say that being associated with the West is like being associated with the plague. Yet they still want to be associated with the West. Why do Russia and China think that their self-esteem depends on Washington’s approval?

FIFA is a Swiss-based organization. Yet the arrests of FIFA officials is based on a Washington-initiated “investigation” by the FBI. By asserting the universality of US law, Washington is asserting the authority of its police and prosecutors over sovereign countries.

Why did Switzerland, and why do other countries lay down in obedience to Washington’s assertion of the universality of its laws? Are the political leaders paid off or are they threatened with assassination or false indictments?

What explains that of all countries on earth only Washington’s law is universal, acknowledged and bowed down before in other countries? Is if fear of retribution?

Possibly, but one answer is that the entire point of being a leader of a foreign country is to be made rich by kowtowing to Washington. One year out of office and Tony Blair was reported to be worth $50 million. Where did the money come from? No one wanted to listen to Blair’s speeches when he was Prime Minister. Why did Americans pay him six-figure sums to give speeches?

Putin can become rich, too. All he needs to do is to turn Russia over to Washington.

Here we are in an orchestrated soccer scandal hyped to the hilt by the presstitute media while all the real scandals go unremarked.

For example, a number of the mega-banks in the West have pleaded guilty to felony charges and only suffered fines. As Finian Cunningham has pointed out, the money laundering and price-rigging by the “banks too big to jail” dwarfs the alleged criminality at FIFA. The Securities and Exchange Commission actually issues waivers to the banks for their criminal activity. One dissenting SEC commissioner accuses her colleagues of encouraging “recidivism” by the constant issue of waivers.

Washington itself cannot be believed as not a single significant statement out of Washington’s mouth since the Clinton regime has been true; yet, Washington still parades around as the arbiter of truth.

Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction. Assad did not use chemical weapons. Iran did not have a nuclear weapons program. Russia did not invade Ukraine. But Washington convinced the world that its lies were true.

It is almost a certainty that politicians up in arms over unsubstantiated charges that FIFA took bribes have themselves taken bribes. Just look at the bribes given to Congress by corporations to vote fast track for TTIP.

Can anyone name even one leader of one EU country (other perhaps than Greece at the moment) who doesn’t take bribes from Washington?

According to Udo Ulfkotte, no one can name even one British or EU newspaper that doesn’t take bribes from the CIA.

How many UN votes are determined by Washington’s threats and bribes?

Whether or not FIFA decisions are tainted by bribery, the purpose of the “investigation” is to cast doubt on the decision to hold the World Cup in Russia. The World Cup is a global spectacle and conveys prestige on the host country. Washington intends to deny this prestige to Russia. That is what the “investigation” is about.

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. Roberts’ latest books are The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West and How America Was Lost.

Clinton Foundation cashed in as Sweden lobbied Hillary

Bill Clinton’s foundation set up a fundraising arm in Sweden that collected $26 million in donations at the same time that country was lobbying Hillary Rodham Clinton’s State Department to forgo sanctions that threatened its thriving business with Iran, according to interviews and documents obtained by The Washington Times.

As US prosecutors go after 14 people — nine current and former FIFA officials, four sports marketing executives and an accused intermediary — in corruption allegations, seven were taken into custody in Zurich on Wednesday.

But strangely the Clintons and their dealings are not up for scrutiny it seems.

The Swedish entity, called the William J. Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse, was never disclosed to or cleared by State Department ethics officials, even though one of its largest sources of donations was a Swedish government-sanctioned lottery.

As the money flowed to the foundation from Sweden, Mrs. Clinton’s team in Washington declined to blacklist any Swedish firms despite warnings from career officials at the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm that Sweden was growing its economic ties with Iran and potentially undercutting Western efforts to end Tehran’s rogue nuclear program, diplomatic cables show.

At the time of Mr. Clinton’s foray into Swedish fundraising, the Swedish government was pressing Mrs. Clinton’s State Department not to impose new sanctions on firms doing business with Iran, including hometown companies Ericsson and Volvo.

Mrs. Clinton’s State Department issued two orders identifying lists of companies newly sanctioned in 2011 and 2012 for doing business with Iran, but neither listed any Swedish entities.

Behind the scenes, however, the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm was clearly warning the State Department in Washington that Sweden’s trade was growing with Iran — despite Swedish government claims to the contrary.

The Swedes were resistant to new sanctions, telling State Department officials repeatedly and unequivocally that they were worried new penalties would stifle the business between its country’s firms and Tehran. At the time, Iran was Sweden’s second-largest export market in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia.

“Behind the Swedish government’s reluctance to support further sanctions in Iran, especially unilateral European measures, is a dynamic (though still fairly small) trade involving some of Sweden’s largest and most politically well-connected companies: Volvo, Ericsson and ABB to name three,” the U.S. Embassy wrote in one cable to Washington.

U.S. intelligence officials told The Times that they kept the Obama administration apprised of Ericsson’s activities inside Iran, including the fact that the Swedish firm had provided Iran’s second-largest cellular provider with location-based technology to track customers for billing purposes. The technology transfer occurred in late 2009, shortly after Tehran brutally suppressed a pro-democracy movement in that country, the officials said.

U.S. intelligence further learned that Ericsson in 2010 discussed with Iran’s largest cellular firm providing tracking technology that could be used directly by Iranian security authorities.

FIFA’s Blatter resigns

Sepp Blatter has announced he is stepping down as president of FIFA, football’s governing body, and has called on a special congress to elect a successor. The news comes less than a week after Blatter was reelected as FIFA chief amid a bribery scandal.

Switzerland’s office of attorney general (OAG) said that it is not investigating Blatter in connection with the FIFA corruption probe.

“Joseph S. Blatter is not under investigation by the OAG. His announced resignation will have no influence on the ongoing criminal proceedings,” the attorney general is cited as saying by Reuters.

Jordan’s Prince Ali bin al-Hussein, who gave in to Blatter during the vote last Friday, will run in the new FIFA election for president, AFP reported.

Sepp Blatter has taken this step to save the organization, Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko has told the Tass news agency.

The new congress will take place between December 2015 and March 2016, the chairman of FIFA’s audit and compliance committee, Domenico Scala, has said. He has taken the floor after Blatter.

Former Daily Show host, the very unfunny John Oliver made Sepp Blatter his personal White Whale, repeatedly calling out the FIFA President on his show with lengthy items detailing the FIFA corruption scandals.

On last Sunday’s show, Oliver begged FIFA sponsors – which include McDonalds, Adidas and Budweiser, to pull their support.

The Guardian as well as the Financial Times singled out South Africa. From The Guardian:

Blatter’s announcement comes after Fifa had admitted it paid $10million destined for the South Africa World Cup to an account controlled by the disgraced former vice-president Jack Warner. The payment followed a letter from the South African FA to Fifa secretary general Jérôme Valcke.

From the FT:

His resignation came at the end of another bruising day for Fifa, after one of his most senior lieutenants, Jérôme Valcke, was alleged to have had personal knowledge of a $10m payment at the heart of a US corruption probe.

Mr Valcke was the recipient of a letter from the South African football association on March 4, 2008, asking him to withhold $10m from the funding of the World Cup “operational budget” and for the money to be “advanced” to a fund controlled by the then “President of Concacaf”, Jack Warner.

The letter, which was shown on South African television, was confirmed by its South African signatory, Molefi Oliphant. “The copy is official,” he said. “That is the copy, you have it, so you can draw any opinion you want to. That is the correct letter,” he said.

SA soccer bid got clean audit from EY

Minister in the Presidency Jeff Radebe said that the claims that a South African official paid a bribe to FIFA to host the 2010 World Cup are untrue.

The awarding of the 2010 FIFA World Cup to South Africa is being investigated by the FBI.

The US Attorney General told a press conference on Wednesday that bribes were allegedly paid to FIFA officials to award the 2010 tournament to South Africa.

“As far as we were concerned, we received a clean audit report from Ernst and Young a reputable audit firm.

“There has never been a suggestion that anything untoward happened,” Radebe said.

Radebe was speaking at a post cabinet briefing in Pretoria on Thursday.

“I was also part of the local organising committee,” Radebe said laughing.

He reminded journalists that at the end of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said the event in South Africa was one of the best ever.

“About what came yesterday [Wednesday], the due process will take place,” he said.

Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula is expected to release a statement on the issue later on Thursday.

Source: eNCA

Clinton Foundation ties to corrupt FIFA uncovered

Both Bill Clinton and his family’s charity have been tied to soccer’s governing body, as well as Qatar’s disastrous World Cup bid.

And just like that, another Clinton Foundation donor is in the news.

The Clinton global charity has received between $50,000 and $100,000 from soccer’s governing body and has partnered with the Fédération Internationale de Football Association on several occasions, according to donor listings on the foundation’s website.

Several top FIFA executives were arrested Wednesday in Zurich and face corruption charges stretching back two decades, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Involvement with the embattled body extends beyond the foundation to Bill Clinton himself. The former president was an honorary chairman of the bid committee put together to promote the United States as a possible host nation for the 2018 or 2022 World Cup.

When the U.S. lost the 2022 bid to Qatar, Clinton was rumored to be so upset he shattered a mirror.

But apparently Qatar tried to make it up to him.

The Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee, partnering with the State of Qatar, “committed to utilizing its research and development for sustainable infrastructure at the 2022 FIFA World Cup to improve food security in Qatar, the Middle East, and other arid and water-stressed regions throughout the world,” according to the Clinton Foundation website.

The cost of the two-year project is not listed on the Clinton Foundation website, but the Qatar 2022 committee gave the foundation between $250,000 and $500,000 in 2014 and the State of Qatar gave between $1 million and $5 million in previous, unspecified years.

FIFA, which has never been a bastion of ethics, was heavily criticized for awarding the 2018 and 2022 World Cup to Russia and Qatar.

The Guardian reported in 2013 about “appalling labor abuses,” including possible forced labor and worker death on Qatar’s World Cup infrastructure projects. It is also considered to be too hot to play soccer in Qatar in the summer.

No Qatari officials have been arrested, but Swiss authorities announced Wednesday that they had opened criminal proceedings into the allocation of the Qatari and Russian World Cups. They have also seized documents from FIFA’s headquarters and gained access to the Swiss bank accounts of executives they suspect of “unjust enrichment” and money laundering.

Source: The Daily Beast

Six top FIFA officials arrested for corruption in Zurich

Only hours before the start of Fifa’s Congress in Zurich, six senior Fifa officials have been arrested in early-morning raids by Swiss authorities – with 14 people understood to be facing corruption charges worldwide.

Officers carried out the dawn raid at the five star Baur au Lac hotel in Zurich, with the Fifa vice-president Jeffrey Webb understood to be among the six detained.

Sepp Blatter was not one of those arrested. Fifa’s spokesman Walter de Gregorio told the Associated Press: “He is not involved at all.”

The Swiss Federal Office of Justice said the officials were arrested pending extradition to the US on suspicion of receiving bribes totalling $100m.

The New York Times reported that the charges arising from an FBI inquiry include wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering, with the US Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch due to hold a news conference later on Wednesday.

NBC’s Bill Neely makes this observation after it emerged that the US charges relate to alleged offences connected to tournaments in the US and Latin America.

So far the names of four officials have been released: Eduardo Li, Jeffrey Webb, Jose Maria Marin and Eugenio Figueredo.

Webb and Figueredo are Fifa vice-presidents. Li was due to join the executive committee on Friday and Marin is a former member of the executive committee.

The New York Times says charges “were also expected against” sports marketing executives Alejandro Burzaco, Aaron Davidson, Hugo Jinkis and Mariano Jinkis.

It said José Margulies has also been charged for allegedly facilitating illegal payments.

Racism in English football is ‘right in your face’

‘ The lack of black and ethnic minority figures in the dugout and the boardroom (is) overt’ – Jeffrey Webb

Racism in English football is overt according to Fifa’s vice-president Jeffrey Webb.

The head of Fifa’s anti-racism task force has said that discrimination in English football is “right in front of your face” and backed calls for the introduction of the Rooney Rule.

Jeffrey Webb, the Concacaf president and Fifa vice-president, said the lack of black and ethnic minority figures in the dugout and the boardroom was overt but that no one wanted to deal with the problem.

Jeffrey Webb
Jeffrey Webb

The Professional Footballers’ Association chief executive Gordon Taylor recently said that racism was a “hidden problem” in English football, making his own call for the Rooney Rule to be introduced.

Webb responded: “I don’t know how it could be hidden. You have 92 clubs, you have two coaches of colour. How many board members or executives are in various club positions or at the FA, in Uefa? So, it’s not hidden.

“It’s hidden from a discussion standpoint. No-one wants to deal with it. No-one wants to deal with it from a commercial standpoint.”

Webb said that he had recently spoken to Eddie Newton, the Chelsea youth coach who has been linked with a move to Schalke 04 with Roberto Di Matteo, who had described his frustration at being unable to secure an interview.

“I hosted a dinner a few months ago, last time I was here. I met a young guy coaching at Chelsea, assistant coach, won a Champions League final, doing well,” said Webb.

“Can’t even get an interview. Eddie Newton. I’m not talking about getting a job, getting an interview. That’s not hidden. That’s right in front of your face.”

Taylor’s intervention kicked off a renewed debate within English football about whether the Rooney Rule should be introduced.

The Kick It Out trustee Garth Crooks hit out at the Football League chairman Greg Clarke for not raising the issue at their summer meeting, while the Football Association and the Premier League have also faced questions over their stance on the issue.

Webb said the Rooney Rule, which would force clubs to ensure that at least one person from a BME background was included on each interview list, should not be necessary in the modern age, but it was.

“In this day and time, in this era, in this century, should we really be having to mandate opportunities for qualified individuals? Sadly, the answer is yes.”

Webb said the pressure for change needed to come from club owners and from fans.

“It has to come within. It has to come from the clubs. It has to start with clubs. It has to start with ownership,” he said. “And, of course, the fans have to demand that there is opportunity, that there is equality. And, unless we have that, don’t expect any changes.

“How many American owners do we have from English Premier League clubs in the UK? So, why have certain standards here and then, of course, in the US, in the NFL leagues, where you live, where you conduct business, you live by different standards?”

Webb also said that Fifa faced a “huge, huge challenge with Russia” ahead of the 2018 World Cup given the prevalence of racism in football there and said that action “must start with education, must come from the top down”. – The Guardian

FIFA 2014: Monkey chants,bananas and homophobia

During a training session with the Spanish national team in 2004, the Spanish national coach Luis Aragonés was recorded by a Spanish TV crew referring to French soccerplayer Thierry Henry as a “black piece of s***” to José Antonio Reyes, Henry’s Arsenal teammate.

That experience, however, is not his alone. In fact, West Ham United players Clyde Best and Ade Coker were subjected to monkey chants when they were playing soccer during the 1960s, 40 years earlier. The chants have continued, and players, such as Jozy Altidore and Danny Alves, have inherited this treatment.

Many believe that thirst for justice will go unquenched and racism will persist.

Racism has given way to a spout of homophobia: Mexico’s fans harmonized a chant, singing “puto” during two recent matches when Mexico was pitted against Cameroon and Brazil.

HBO’s “Real Sports,” hosted by Bryant Gumbel, aired an episode in April, entitled “Soccer Racism.” The episode reported on the frequent displays of racism in European football, which have gone to show the “ugly side of a beautiful game.” Several black soccer players spoke about it.

Sometimes slang for “fag” or “man whore” or “coward,” the word being used during Mexican soccer matches only dates back to 2003, which discredits the usage as a tradition. FIFA, which isn’t a fan of inflammatory remarks, has launched an investigation to examine Mexican fans’ use of “puto.”

Giovanni Marti from FIFA’s Media Department encourages individuals and groups to submit any evidence in their possession with regard to discriminatory behavior for the analysis and consideration of the FIFA Disciplinary Committee.

While it’s too early to know how FIFA plans to handle Mexico’s fans, if history is any indicator, little may be done. Though, if they were looking to make an example of a team, it’d more likely be Mexico than a European team. But, why punish Mexico now and not 10 years ago when the word first came into rotation?

And with 2018’s World Cup taking place in Russia, a country that known for its anti-black sentiment, many wonder if banana tossing and monkey cries will persist.

Source: latinpost.com

Brazil burning

brazilcupProtests in Brazil indicate what goes way, way beyond a cheap bus fare.

When, in late 2010, Dilma Rousseff was elected President after eight years of the impossibly popular Lula, a national narrative was already ingrained, stressing that Brazil was not the “country of the future” anymore; the future had arrived, and this was a global power in the making.

This was a country on overdrive – from securing the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics to a more imposing role as part of the BRICS group of emerging powers.

Not unlike China, Brazil was breathlessly exploiting natural resources – from its hinterland to parts of Africa – while betting heavily on large agribusiness mostly supplying, you guess it, China.

But above all Brazil fascinated the world by incarnating this political UFO; a benign, inclusive giant, on top of it benefitting from a lavish accumulation of soft power (music, football, beautiful beaches, beautiful women, endless partying).

The country was finally enjoying the benefits of a quarter of a century of participative democracy – and self-satisfied that for the past ten years Lula’s extensive social inclusion policies had lifted arguably 40 million Brazilians to middle class status.

Yet this breakneck capitalist dream masked serious cracks. Locally there may be euphoria for becoming the sixth or seventh world economy, but still social exclusion was far from gone. Brazil remained one the most unequal nations in the world, peppered with retrograde landowning oligarchies and some of the most rapacious, arrogant and ignorant elites on the planet – by-products of Portuguese colonialism.

And then, once again, corruption raised its Hydra-like head. Here’s a first parallel with Turkey. In Brazil as in Turkey, participative democracy was co-opted, ignored or forcefully diluted among an orgy of “mega-projects” generating dubious profits for a select few. In Turkey it revolves around the ruling party AKP’s collusion with business interests in the “redevelopment” of Istanbul; in Brazil around public funds for the hosting of the World Cup and the Olympics.

The new capitalist dream could not mask that the quality of life in Brazil’s big cities seemed to be on a downward spiral; and that racism – especially in the police – never went away while the demonization of peasant and Native Brazilian leaders was rampant; after all they were obstructing the way of powerful agribusiness interests and the “mega-projects” craze.

There’s no Turkey Spring – as there’s no Brazilian Spring. This isn’t Tunisia and Egypt. Both Turkey and Brazil are democracies – although Prime Minister Erdogan has clearly embarked on a polarizing strategy and an authoritarian drive. What links Turkey and Brazil is that irreversible pent-up resentment against institutional politics (and corruption) may be catalyzed by a relatively minor event.

In Turkey it was the destruction of Gezi park; in Brazil the ten-cent hike in public bus fares was the proverbial straw that broke the (white) elephant’s back. In both cases the institutional response was tear gas and rubber bullets. In Turkey the popular backlash spread to a few cities. In Brazil it went nationwide.

This goes way, way beyond a cheap bus ride – although the public transport scene in Brazil’s big cities would star in Dante’s ninth circle of hell. A manual worker, a student, a maid usually spend up to four hours a day back-and-forth in appalling conditions. And these are private transport rackets controlled by a small group of businessmen embedded with local politicians, who they obviously own.

Arguably the nationwide, mostly peaceful protests have scored a victory – as nine cities have decided to cancel the bus fare hike. But that’s just the beginning.

The mantra is true; Brazilians pay developed world taxes and in return get sub-Saharan Africa quality of service. The notion of “value for money” is non-existent. It gets even worse as the economic miracle is over. That magical “growth” was less than 1% in 2012, and only 0.6% in the first quarter of 2013. The immensely bloated state bureaucracy, the immensely appalling public infrastructure, virtually no investment in education as teachers barely get paid $300 a month, non-stop political corruption scandals, not to mention as many homicides a year as narco-purgatory Mexico – none of this is going away by magic.

Football passion apart – and this is a nation where everyone is either an expert footballer or an experienced coach – the vast majority of the population is very much aware the current Confederations Cup and the 2014 World Cup are monster FIFA rackets. As a columnist for the Brazilian arm of ESPN has coined it, “the Cup is theirs, but we pay the bills.”

Public opinion is very much aware the Feds played hardball to get the “mega-events” to Brazil and then promised rivers of “social” benefits in terms of services and urban development. None of that happened. Thus the collective feeling that “we’ve been robbed” – all over again, as anyone with a digital made in China calculator can compare this multi-billion dollar orgy of public funds for FIFA with pathetically little investment in health, education, transportation and social welfare. A banner in the Sao Paulo protests said it all; “Your son is ill? Take him to the arena.” – RT

FIFA to discuss ‘concrete proposals’ to fight racism

FIFA is to discuss “concrete proposals” for combating racism over the next few months and plans to put them into effect in May, soccer’s governing body said on Friday.

The proposals will be chewed over by FIFA’s executive committee at its next meeting in March and then presented to the annual Congress in Mauritius in May which is expected to have the final say, FIFA said.

“I am very pleased with the ideas that have evolved today and look forward to the deliberations with the executive committee next month,” said FIFA president Sepp Blatter following a meeting of the strategic committee.

“The aim is to present to the FIFA Congress in Mauritius in May concrete actions, as well as strong sanctions which will really have an impact.”

FIFA did not elaborate on what the proposals were.

Blatter has previously suggested that points deductions and even relegation could be used as sanctions for teams whose supporters are found guilty of racist behaviour.

Bulgaria, whose fans racially insulted a Danish player, and Hungary, whose fans were found guilty of anti-Semitic behaviour during a friendly at home to Israel, were recently ordered to play their next home World Cup qualifiers behind closed doors.

Italian authorities have drawn up plans for stopping games in cases of racism. Referees and the fourth official have been told to report incidents to public security officials who would have the final say. – Reuters