Yahoo – AFP,
22 Sep 2014
A computer
generated image shows the stadium to be built in Al-Wakrah for the
Qatar 2022
World Cup (AFP Photo)
|
Berlin
(AFP) - Qatar will not host the World Cup in 2022, according to Theo Zwanziger,
the German member on the executive committee of world football's governing body
FIFA.
"I
think that at the end of the day the 2022 World Cup will not take place in
Qatar," Zwanziger said in an interview with Sport Bild Plus.
The former
head of the German football federation (DFB) cited high summer temperatures as
the reason Qatar would lose the right to host football's global showpiece.
Migrant
labourers work on a construction site
on October 3, 2013 in Doha in Qatar (AFP
Photo/Karim Jaafar)
|
Zwanziger
said: "Doctors say, and I had insisted on this point in the protocol, that
they cannot guarantee that a World Cup can be held in summer in these
conditions."
While Qatar
has reportedly developed stadium cooling systems, Zwanziger said "the
World Cup involves not only stadiums. There are fans coming from the four
corners of the world who will be concerned by the heat".
"The
first incident putting a life in danger will be subject to an investigation.
And that, nobody in the FIFA Executive Committee would want to reply to."
But in an
interview with Die Welt newspaper, Hassan al-Thawadi, secretary-general of the
Qatar 2022 organising committee, declared himself "sure that the 2022
World Cup would take place in Qatar".
"No,
I'm not worried," he said. "Firstly because there's no basis to lose
the World Cup.
"And
secondly because it's the first World Cup in the Middle East.
"When
people think of this region, it's rather in terms of conflict. The World Cup
will be an occasion to unite peoples. It will leave a positive heritage."
Controversy
has plagued FIFA's awarding of the World Cup to Qatar in 2010, with summer
temperatures in the Gulf emirate reaching the upper-40s Celsius.
The idea of
switching the World Cup to cooler winter months does not sit comfortably with
all officials of Europe's big leagues.
Gas-rich
Qatar has also come under the spotlight over foreign workers' rights as well as
accusations that corruption played a part in winning the right to host the
World Cup.
Britain's
Sunday Times newspaper has alleged that former Qatari football boss Mohamed Bin
Hammam paid more than $5 million (3.7m euros) to gain support for the emirate
ahead of the vote.
Qatar has
strongly denied the allegations.
FIFA's
ethic committee is to announce in early 2015 the results of its investigation
into the attribution of not only the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, but also the 2018
edition to Russia.
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