close
Thursday March 28, 2024

Wenger hopes Britain-Russia tensions don’t affect Arsenal tie: ‘Spy poisoning hurting Russia World Cup’

By AFP
April 05, 2018

MOSCOW: Russia World Cup organisers are more worried about Moscow’s latest diplomatic standoff with the West than stadiums being completed on time, a report said Wednesday.

Alexei Sorokin, the organising committee chief for Russia 2018, told the Kommersant newspaper Wednesday the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal was “not helping” preparations.

The nerve agent attack in England sparked mass expulsions and a decision by Britain and a few of its allies not to send officials to the June 14 opening ceremony.“Our main problem rests abroad — not with infrastructure,” Sorokin said. “Any incident, whether it occurred naturally or was created artificially, is being used to put pressure on World Cup organisers.”

Sorokin said he was confident there is “nothing we cannot finish on time” as organisers race to complete six new stadiums, while airports are still being upgraded and roads built in many of the 11 host cities.

But he believes Moscow’s critics are trying to use the fallout surrounding the poisoning of Skripal to drive down attendances at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s prestige event. “I think the intention was there, but it is not working,” said Sorokin.

Moscow and London have been trading diplomatic barbs almost daily since Skripal and his daughter Yulia fell ill in Salisbury on March 4. Britain accuses Russia of poisoning Skripal in retribution for passing on state secrets to London.

Russia’s foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin on Wednesday called it a “grotesque provocation” concocted by UK and US security services.Meanwhile, world football’s governing body FIFA said Tuesday international demand accounted for 53 percent of the 1.7 million tickets sold so far.

Yet sales in England have been atypically weak. FIFA sold about 400,000 tickets between March 13 and April 1.England accounted for less than one percent of that figure and have purchased just 31,000 tickets so far. Concerns have been compounded by an attack by hundreds of Russian hooligans on English fans in the French port of Marseille during Euro 2016. Sorokin told the Sport Express news site Wednesday he has discussed Russia’s security measures with British embassy staff.

Meanwhile, Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said Wednesday he hoped ‘complicated’ political relations between Britain and Russia would not spill onto the football field when his side face CSKA Moscow in a European tie in London.

Britain has suspended high-level diplomatic contact with the Russian government after a former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with a nerve agent in the southern English cathedral city of Salisbury on March 4.

UK authorities have said the Skripals were poisoned with the Soviet-designed nerve agent Novichok and that it was “highly likely” the Russian government was behind the attack.

The crisis has led to a further deterioration in already strained relations between Russia and western nations, with both sides expelling scores of diplomats. Even before the poisoning incident, concerns had been raised over the safety of England fans at this year’s World Cup in Russia.

Russian hooligans were involved in several clashes with rival supporters during the 2016 European Championships in France, with both England and Russia threatened with expulsion from the tournament because of their fans’ violence.