Two U.S. senators have written to FIFA to request that "Russia be banned from the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and stripped of the right to host the 2018 tournament, over its invasion of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula," according to Martin Pengelly of the London GUARDIAN. In their letter to FIFA President Sepp Blatter, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Dan Coates of Indiana, both Republicans, cited the exclusion of Yugoslavia from the 1992 European Championship and 1994 World Cup and said, "Since Russia has similarly displayed a brazen disrespect for fundamental principles of Fifa and international law, [we] hope you will agree that it doesn’t deserve the honour of either hosting the World Cup or participating in one." The letter also cites FIFA statutes calling for suspension if a country or people are discriminated against: "According to Article 3 of the Fifa statutes: 'discrimination of any kind against a country, private person or group of people on account of ethnic origin, gender, language, religion, politics or any other reason is strictly prohibited and punishable by suspension or expulsion'" (GUARDIAN, 3/7). In N.Y., Michael R. Crittenden wrote FIFA did not immediately "respond to a request for comment." The U.S. "is currently ranked 13th in the world in FIFA’s world rankings, while Russia is 22nd." The World Cup "has the potential to pit the U.S. and Russia in an on-field clash if both teams make it out of the tournament’s group stage" (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 3/7).
