BRUSELAS, 15 Feb. (EUROPA PRESS) –
A group of 12 left-wing MEPs have requested this Thursday by letter to UEFA and FIFA to exclude Israel and Israeli teams from their competitions due to their “continued violations of Human Rights” in Palestine.
Understanding that football cannot “serve as a showcase” for “those who violate the rights of the Palestinian people”, the MEPs ask in a letter for both sports institutions to “expel, immediately and as a measure of pressure, the national team and the teams.” of all European and international competitions until this genocide ends.
“The indiscriminate murder of the civilian population, the blocking of humanitarian aid or the destruction of infrastructure – which also affects players, referees, officials and sports facilities – constitutes a crime against which we cannot remain immobile,” said the initiative led by the IU MEP Manu Pineda, who is supported by a dozen MEPs, of Spanish, Irish and Belgian nationality.
The letter is signed by the Spanish parliamentarians, Javier Nart (liberal), María Eugenia Rodríguez Palop, Miguel Urban, Esther Sanz, Idoia Villanueva (Unidas Podemos) and Ana Miranda (BNG). The letter calls on both sports institutions to make effective their statement of “promoting through football the values of equality, respect and Human Rights” and gives as an example the boycott against South Africa during apartheid.