{"id":2885871,"date":"2026-07-17T16:53:46","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T16:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/2885871\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T16:53:46","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T16:53:46","slug":"uk-minister-urges-fifa-to-investigate-argentina-over-world-cup-falklands-banner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/2885871\/","title":{"rendered":"UK minister urges FIFA to investigate Argentina over World Cup Falklands banner"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>          <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/AFP049116_00.pre.jpg\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t      A British minister Thursday called for FIFA to investigate after Argentina&#8217;s players held up a banner reading Las Malvinas son Argentinas (The Falklands are Argentine) after their 2-1 victory over England.<br \/>  Prime Minister Keir Starmer&#8217;s Downing Street office backed the calls by Business Minister Peter Kyle following the World Cup semi-final match.<br \/>  Kyle called the flag waving an egregious violation of FIFA rules which ban political symbols on the field of play.<br \/>  The World Cup might not be ours, but the Falkland Islands definitely are, a Downing Street spokesperson said.<br \/>  Argentina invaded the British Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic in 1982.<br \/>  But Britain regained the archipelago in a brief war after then prime minister Margaret Thatcher dispatched a naval taskforce.<br \/>  Kyle urged football&#8217;s global governing body FIFA to thoroughly investigate the banner incident after Wednesday&#8217;s match in Atlanta.<br \/>  Politics needs to be separate from football. In fact, the World Cup has one of its central tenets that politics is separate from football, he told BBC television.<br \/>  That is now a matter for FIFA &#8230; We expect FIFA to undertake an investigation into this, he added.<br \/>  FIFA has not yet commented on the incident.<br \/>  Britain occupied the Falklands in the 19th century, but Argentina claims the islands are part of its territory.<br \/>  Argentina President Javier Milei meanwhile called the stunt perfectly valid and legitimate.<br \/>  It&#8217;s a feeling that exists within all Argentines, he told El Observador radio station.<br \/>  But he urged against mixing politics with sport, adding that a football match is a football match.<br \/>  The Malvinas are Argentine, we&#8217;re going to recover them, and we will do it through diplomatic means, said Milei.<br \/>  Argentina&#8217;s vice president, Victoria Villarruel, upped the tensions ahead of Wednesday&#8217;s kick-off by calling the English usurping pirates.<br \/>  The 1982 conflict ended with the deaths of 649 Argentines and 255 Britons.<br \/>  Following their World Cup semi-final victory, Argentina&#8217;s foreign minister said Buenos Aires had filed a formal protest over a British warship near the Falkland Islands.<br \/>  Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno posted on X to express the strongest rejection of the United Kingdom&#8217;s HMS Medway&#8217;s unconsulted and illegal passage through Argentine territorial waters, alleging a lack of proper notification.<br \/>  Quirno said the Medway, which is based in the Falkland Islands, was accused of violating bilateral agreements in a July 13-dated diplomatic note of protest submitted to the UK embassy in Buenos Aires.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A British minister Thursday called for FIFA to investigate after Argentina&#8217;s players held up a banner re<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2885872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[785161],"tags":[133793,98706,528524,32077,23370,939,1670,98751,73191,11802,200,125020,78392,6798,17757,812,4817,3687,4313,31168,1712,345531,6330,784979,2722,11034,784980,1668,3843,13633,11786,3577,16899,21135,302851,482,14115,577,1669],"class_list":["post-2885871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-argentina","tag-argentina","tag-jiji","tag-topics","tag-topix","tag-23370","tag-939","tag-1670","tag-98751","tag-73191","tag-11802","tag-200","tag-125020","tag-78392","tag-6798","tag-17757","tag-812","tag-4817","tag-3687","tag-4313","tag-31168","tag-1712","tag-345531","tag-6330","tag-784979","tag-2722","tag-11034","tag-784980","tag-1668","tag-3843","tag-13633","tag-11786","tag-3577","tag-16899","tag-21135","tag-302851","tag-482","tag-14115","tag-577","tag-1669"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/wakoka.com\/@news\/116936363578135008","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2885871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2885871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2885871\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2885872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2885871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2885871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2885871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}