[News] FIFA are accused of breaking their human rights policy to hand Saudi Arabia the 2034 World Cup hosting

Leading human rights activist group, Human Rights Watch has accused FIFA of ignoring its own rules in the process of awarding hosting duties for the 2030 and 2034 World Cup tournaments.

Spain, Portugal, and Morocco effectively secured hosting rights for the centennial FIFA World Cup in 2030 after a surprise announcement it had been approved as the sole candidate by the FIFA Council, thus requiring just the formalities of a successful bidding process and ratification by next year’s Congress.

The plan controversially includes special one-off matches in the South American nations of Uruguay, Argentina, and Paraguay.

FIFA additionally set a tight deadline of October 31 for countries to register interest in the 2034 World Cup, and ruled it can only be held in Asia or Oceania.

 

Saudi Arabia promptly declared its intention to bid and received backing from the Asian Football Confederation, with an Australian-led project viewed as the only potential challenge but unlikely to muster sufficient support.

Human Rights Watch alleged the process breached the May 2017 version of FIFA’s Human Rights Policy, pointing to Article Seven which states “where the national context risks undermining FIFA’s ability to ensure respect for internationally recognised human rights, FIFA will constructively engage with the relevant authorities and other stakeholders and make every effort to uphold its international human rights responsibilities”.

The non-Governmental organisational additionally pointed to the Key Principles of the Reformed Bidding Process published for the 2026 edition awarded to the United States, Mexico, and Canada, in which FIFA President Gianni Infantino and secretary general Fatma Samoura wrote the host must “formally commit to conducting their activities based on sustainable event management principles and to respecting international human rights and labour standards according to the United Nations’ Guiding Principles”.

It said an “unreasonably tight” deadline had been set for the 2034 World Cup, and it had “so far failed to apply these principles in the award of the 2030 and 2034 World Cups”.

 

Human Rights Watch also drew a contrast to the double award of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups to Russia and Qatar respectively back in 2010, widely viewed as contributing to the downfall of disgraced former FIFA President Sepp Blatter.

The vote on host nation was then decided by the former FIFA Executive Committee, but this shifted to a Congressional vote for the 2026 edition.
Human Rights Watch director of global initiatives Minky Worden called on FIFA in to delay its process for the 2034 edition.

“FIFA is failing in its responsibility to the world of football to conduct World Cup bidding and selection procedures in an ethical, transparent, objective, and unbiased way,” Worden said.

“If there’s to be any integrity in what remains of this process, FIFA needs to immediately delay and open the bidding process for the 2034 World Cup, make public its labour, human rights, and environment policies, and then make sure protections are fully carried out.”

 

She added a potential World Cup in Saudi Arabia “exposes FIFA’s commitments to human rights as a sham”.