MOSCOW (AP) – Five months after the annexation of Crimea, Russia and Ukraine are now squabbling over soccer clubs in the region.
Defying authorities in Ukraine, Russia is incorporating three Crimean teams into its own leagues – a move that could strain relations between the host country of the 2018 World Cup and the sport’s world governing body.
The three Crimean clubs – SKChF Sevastopol, Zhemchuzhina Yalta and Tavria Simferopol – will leave Ukrainian soccer and play in the second division south, part of the Russian league system’s third tier, the Russian Football Union said in a statement.
Ukrainian soccer officials called on FIFA and European governing body UEFA to respond, saying Russia has no right to run the sport on what Ukraine considers its territory. FIFA has already rejected calls for Russia to be stripped of the World Cup in the wake of the downing of a Malaysian airliner over Ukraine.
“We can’t do the work of FIFA and UEFA,” Ukrainian Football Federation spokesman Pavel Ternovoi told The Associated Press on Friday. “We hope that in the near future these bodies take the corresponding decisions.”