FIFA President Gianni Infantino, delivering a speech at the Atlantic Council in New York, mentioned the war of Russia against Ukraine.
“I am a simple football person. In this room tonight we have many more leaders from the fields of politics and economics. There are many world leaders here, many business leaders. That’s why my appeal and the appeal from all those who love football around the world is actually very simple.
We all know that we, unfortunately, live in a divided world, in an aggressive world, in a complicated world. Like all of you, I suffer when I see children suffer. I want to cry when I see the tears of mothers — whether in Gaza, or Ukraine, or Sudan, or Libya, or anywhere in the world. There are 80 countries where conflicts are happening. We all suffer when we see what is happening. But, like many of you, I believe that people are fundamentally good, not bad. And we must believe in ourselves, dear leaders, we believe in you too.
We need peace in the world. How can we achieve it? Well, if I knew, I would have done it a long time ago, I don’t know. But the secret, probably, like everything else in life, is to believe in it and work for it. So let’s just work more. Let’s bring more people together. Let’s just create opportunities for people to meet each other and get to know each other a little better. We want you to succeed. We want the world to succeed. We want to unite the world and we want peace,” Infantino is quoted by The Athletic.