MEXICO CITY
\nIran\u2019s football federation is \u201cnegotiating\u201d with Fifa to relocate the country\u2019s first-round matches at the World Cup to Mexico from the United States, citing the conflict in the Middle East, said Iran\u2019s embassy in Mexico.
\nIran\u2019s participation at this summer\u2019s finals in the US, Canada and Mexico has been thrown into doubt since the war began late last month.
\n\u201cWhen [US President Donald] Trump has explicitly stated that he cannot ensure the security of the Iranian national team, we will certainly not travel to America,\u201d Iranian football chief Mehdi Taj said in remarks posted on the embassy\u2019s X account.
\n\u201cWe are currently negotiating with Fifa to hold Iran\u2019s matches in the World Cup in Mexico.\u201d
\nIran are scheduled to face New Zealand and Belgium in Los Angeles, followed by Egypt in Seattle.
\nThe team\u2019s base camp for the tournament is currently slated to be located in Tucson, Arizona.
\nAbolfazl Pasandideh, Iran\u2019s ambassador to Mexico, on Monday denounced \u201cthe US government\u2019s lack of cooperation regarding visa issuance and the provision of logistical support\u201d for the Iranian delegation ahead of the World Cup, in a statement published on the embassy\u2019s website.
\nHe added that he had also \u201csuggested to Fifa that Iran\u2019s matches be moved from the United States to Mexico.\u201d
\nFifa did not immediately respond to a request for comment from AFP.
\nTrump triggered uproar last week after stating that while Iran\u2019s football team would be \u201cwelcome\u201d in the US, they should not travel to the tournament \u201cfor their own life and safety.\u201d
\nTrump\u2019s comments came after Fifa president Gianni Infantino had given assurances that Trump had promised him that the Iranian team would be welcome.
\nIran hit back at Trump\u2019s comments saying \u201cno one can exclude Iran\u2019s national team from the World Cup.\u201d
\nIran\u2019s place at the tournament was thrown into question after the United States and Israel launched a massive offensive against the Islamic Republic, which responded with waves of missiles and drones targeting Israeli territory and American targets across the Middle East.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MEXICO CITY Iran\u2019s football federation is \u201cnegotiating\u201d with Fifa to relocate the country\u2019s first-round matches at the World Cup to Mexico from the United States, citing the conflict in the Middle East, said Iran\u2019s embassy in Mexico. Iran\u2019s participation at this summer\u2019s finals in the US, Canada and Mexico has been thrown into doubt since …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":95240,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":95248,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95227\/revisions\/95248"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}