FIFA Issues World Cup Accreditation to Jailed French Journalist

FIFA issued World Cup accreditation to French sports journalist Christophe Gleizes, authorizing him to cover the tournament for the magazine So Foot. The accreditation covers the entire event, scheduled across the United States, Canada and Mexico from June 11 to July 19. An empty seat represented Gleizes during FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s news conference on the eve of the tournament.

Infantino said he hoped “the only sports journalist currently imprisoned in the world” would be freed during the event and “even be able to join us during the World Cup”. ” He had earlier been convicted of contact with members of the Movement for the Self-Determination of Kabylie, a group Algiers has designated a terrorist organisation. The sentence was upheld on appeal in December.

Gleizes was arrested in May 2024 while travelling to northeastern Algeria’s Kabylie region to report on the country’s most decorated football club, JSK. In March he withdrew an appeal to the Supreme Court. On June 3 Algeria’s highest court of appeal rejected prosecutors’ request for a tougher sentence.

Gleizes’s parents, Sylvie and Francis Godard, expressed gratitude to FIFA and appealed for clemency from Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune. ” Algeria traditionally issues pardons on July 5, the day marking independence from French colonial rule in 1962.