ZURICH: Fifa gave Iraq football officials an extra year in office to prepare for elections, after a sectarian dispute meant the federation missed a deadline to vote for new leaders.
Monday’s decision lifts the threat of Iraq being suspended from world football and allows the national team to prepare to defend its Asian Cup title next January.
Fifa’s emergency committee – comprising president Sepp Blatter and leaders of the six continental confederations – extended the mandate of the Iraqi Football Association executive through July 2011.
“This deadline should allow both groups to settle their differences and to thus permit the election of a new board,” Fifa said in a statement.
A scheduled poll was canceled last month when a Sunni faction supporting current IFA president Hussein Saeed met in Irbil, claiming it was too dangerous to travel to Baghdad, where backers of Shiite challenger Falah Hassan had gathered. Iraq’s government insisted on holding it in Baghdad as a way of showing the country is stable after years of war.
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