Macron returns to Qatar for love of sport, despite criticism

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PARIS (AP) French President Emmanuel Macron is set to fly to Qatar for the second time in a week, despite widespread concerns about the emirate’s human rights and environmental record. Why? Because France are in the final of the World Cup and Macron is truly a huge football fan as well as a prominent defender of the longstanding partnership between the two countries.

A video released after France’s victory over Morocco in the semi-finals showed an enthusiastic Macron mingling with the French players in the dressing room on Wednesday evening at the Doha stadium, applauding to the sound of the musical hit Libéré du Désir which became the anthem of the team victory.

The World Cup in Qatar has sparked multiple controversies ranging from the living conditions of migrant workers to the environmental impact of air-conditioned stadiums and the status of LGBTQ people, as well as women and minorities. Many activists, especially in Europe, had called for a boycott of the tournament.

Some on social media have also noted that the six-hour flight from Paris to Doha is fuel-intensive and climate-unfriendly, in apparent contradiction to Macron’s previous commitments.

At an EU summit in Brussels on Thursday, Macron said he fully stands by his decision. I support the France team and I think the French too, he said.

He mentioned the more than 20 million viewers who watched the semi-final on TF1, a record for a World Cup match since 2006. The figures are there. We love our national team, we are proud of it, we want it to win, Macron said.

A 44-year-old sportsman, Macron played football with the ENA team in the 2000s. He is a supporter of the club in Marseille, in the south of France, and played a charity football match last year. , a first for a French president in office, during which he scored from the penalty spot.

Macron was also seen boxing at a campaign event in the northern suburbs of Paris in April this year, just before he was re-elected for a second term, a sport he would practice with some of the officers in charge. of his safety.

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The French president had announced in advance that he would attend the semi-final and the final if France qualified as they had in the previous World Cup won by the French in Russia in 2018.

Responding to criticism, he said last month that sport should not be politicized.

Paris and some other major French cities have decided not to show World Cup matches on giant screens in public fan zones due to concerns over Qatar’s human rights record.

Macron, who said he would meet with Qatari officials on Sunday, appears to be sticking to his traditional approach to diplomacy of talking about difficult issues with other world leaders whenever necessary, according to the French presidency. .

He is one of the few world leaders to have kept an open line with Russian President Vladimir Putin since the start of the war in Ukraine.

The France-Qatar relationship, which dates back to the emirate’s independence in the 1970s, includes a wide range of political, economic and security agreements that involve oil contracts, arms sales and cultural exchanges. First French football club, Paris Saint-Germain has belonged to Qatar Sports Investments for more than 11 years.

When Macron visited Qatar a year ago, he issued a joint statement with the country’s ruling emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. The two leaders pledged to strengthen economic cooperation and work together to address global challenges, including regional security, terrorism, climate change and energy transition.

Civil campaign group Avaaz published an ad in two French newspapers on Wednesday denouncing Macron’s trip to Qatar, saying the players don’t need you at the World Cup. The planet yes.

We thought it was a shocking failure of leadership that Emmanuel Macron was going to watch football instead of attending an ongoing UN biodiversity conference in Canada, said Avaaz campaign manager Oscar Soria, on Twitter.

Some left-wing French politicians have also criticized Macron’s trips to the emirate.

A Green member of the European Parliament, Yannick Jadot, said this week that visiting Qatar was a political mistake, especially in the context of the corruption scandal which led the European Union parliament to suspend work on all cases involving Qatar.

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AP World Cup coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/world-cup and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

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