Germany, the country of traditional football, is also dealing with human rights violations in Qatar in connection with the World Cup. Therefore, many restaurants will not provide guests with live broadcasts of matches. For example, Cologne’s famous Lotta pub joined the boycott, which celebrated the success of the German national team at the 2014 championship in Brazil. Co-owner Peter Zimmermann argues, for example, with the “corrupt” International Football Association Federation (FIFA), which, while profit-oriented, does not look after human rights or football itself. Bar Krüger in Berlin and pub Mit Schmackes in Dortmund have taken a similar stance. he told Deutsche Welle servers and agents about it AP.

“We want to set an example and challenge the corruption-ridden functioning of FIFA’s organisation, where everything is really just about money. Nobody cares about human rights and football culture,” said Zimmermann, an avid soccer fan, but who has criticized inequality between men and women in Qatar, discrimination against homosexuals, and poor working conditions in Qatar.

On Sunday evening, as the first kick-off of the Qatar Championship took place, the doors of the Lotta pub remained closed. Monday is supposed to be a pub quiz, and on Tuesday evening there will be a panel which will focus on the situation in Qatar and FIFA’s organizational procedures. In the following days, the program will include, for example, darts, table football tournaments or movie nights. At the restaurant facility, they even took the entire protest so seriously that they even threw away all the beer bottles bearing the football championship logo. This boycott case spread on social networks in such a way that even a Japanese television crew went to Cologne.

Lotta’s co-owner of the pub claims that despite the expected drop in sales, he doesn’t regret his decision. “The World Cup always means more guests, especially when Germany is playing. However, we have our regular customers and I hope that even with alternative programmes, many more will come. We love football, but this year’s championship is too much for us ,” Zimmerman said.

Steif Krüger, who runs a bar of the same name in Berlin, also joined the boycott. “It’s terrible what happened in Qatar,” Kruger claimed. “The people who regularly watch football with us know our decision and support it,” he added. Kevin Grosskreutz, owner of the Mit Schmackes pub, also decided to boycott the championship. “We love football. I would even say that we live by football. But obviously we are not going to broadcast, even if it means lower profits for us,” said Grosskreutz.

But the boycott of the championship concerns not only pubs and similar businesses, but also the customers themselves. German sporting goods store Intersport reported a 50% drop in demand for football jerseys. These are traditionally sold in bulk during major soccer tournaments. There were also protests against the controversial championship at German football stadiums before it started.

The BBC did not broadcast the FIFA World Cup opening ceremony

British public broadcaster BBC did not broadcast the World Cup opening ceremony in Qatar on Sunday. Instead, he put on broadcast programming highly critical of the host country, wrote the website The Guardian, according to which a live broadcast of the ceremony could only be viewed on the BBC’s website.

“This is the most controversial World Cup in history and the ball hasn’t even been kicked,” set the tone for presenter and former footballer Gary Lineker as he greeted viewers at the start of the BBC One programme. In it, there is criticism of the way third world workers are treated in Middle Eastern countries, or the insufficient rights of women and homosexuals. There is also talk of corruption in the international football federation FIFA.

While stars from the world of music and film performed at the opening ceremony, the BBC offered interviews with representatives of the human rights organization Amnesty International. On the day that the COP27 climate conference in Egypt ended, there was also a statement that no world football championship has such a large carbon footprint.