The awarding of the 2034 FIFA World Cup to Saudi Arabia has ignited intense global debate due to the country’s documented involvement in war crimes and ongoing severe human rights abuses. The bid’s approval raises serious concerns about FIFA’s ethical standards and its willingness to overlook grave violations to advance commercial and geopolitical interests. Saudi Arabia’s actions in Yemen, including indiscriminate airstrikes and a blockade contributing to massive civilian suffering, alongside a domestic surge in executions and suppression of dissent, cast a dark shadow over the tournament.
The Saudi-led war in Yemen and war crimes allegations
Since 2015, Saudi Arabia has led a coalition intermediating militarily in Yemen’s civil war. Reports from Human Rights Watch and the United Nations describe wide war crimes attributed to the coalition, including airstrikes that have hit mercenary targets like seminaries, hospitals, marriages, and commerce.
For example, a 2016 burial airstrike killed at least 140 civilians and injured over 500, with Saudi Arabia admitting responsibility but attributing it to incorrect intelligence. The Saudi- led leaguer on Yemeni anchorages has further aggravated shortage by confining food and medical inventories, conduct considered war crimes under transnational philanthropic law. The prolonged leaguer and magpie bombing operations have caused knockouts of thousands of mercenary deaths, violent suffering, and a philanthropic extremity labeled by some as one of the worst in recent history.
Domestic human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia
While its war record draws transnational combinations, Saudi Arabia’s internal mortal rights abuses persist with intimidating intensity. In 2025 alone, Human Rights Watch recorded at least 241 prosecutions, numerous of which were carried out without due process or fair trials, frequently targeting peaceful dissentients, intelligencers, and nonage groups.
Cases like the prosecution of intelligencer Turki al- Jasser stressed the Saudi government’s use of the death penalty to silence critical voices. In addition to prosecutions, detainees face torture, arbitrary detention, executed discoveries, and repression of free speech. Women’s rights remain heavily confined, alongside harsh penalties for LGBTQ individualities, including the death penalty in some cases, indicating deep systemic demarcation.
International complicity and evasion of accountability
Saudi Arabia’s war crimes in Yemen and domestic suppression have been met substantially with muted transnational responses. Reports reveal how the Kingdom leverages profitable and political leverage to avoid meaningful responsibility. In 2021, efforts by the United Nations to probe war crimes in Yemen were halted under Saudi pressure. The United States’ Government Responsibility Office blamed America’s failure to duly check the use of US- made munitions in Yemen, pressing transnational conspiracy. This strategic elusion extends to transnational sport awarding Saudi Arabia the FIFA World Cup amplifies these geopolitical dynamics, potentially shielding the governance from review under the guise of sports tactfulness.
The FIFA decision amidst humanitarian crisis
FIFA’s decision to award the 2034 World Cup to Saudi Arabia in December 2024 unfolded amid a heightening philanthropic extremity, marked by the Kingdom’s Yemen war crimes including airstrikes killing over 19,000 civilians since 2015 and a 2025 prosecution swell exceeding 300 individualities, numerous via illegal trials reliant on torture. This choice parallels the 2022 Qatar selection, where FIFA overlooked migratory worker abuses that claimed at least 6,500 lives through heatstroke, exploitation, and kafala system thrall, assessing no list remedies despite pledges.
Also, Saudi Arabia’s shot ignored core pitfalls like arbitrary detentions of activists, women’s rights repression, and judicial independence failures, as detailed in a May 2025 legal complaint by experts Mark Pieth, Stefan Wehrenberg, and Rodney Dixon, professing FIFA traduced its own mortal rights programs by pacing without compliance guarantees. The expedited shot process aggravated these oversights, with FIFA opening sessions for just 25 days after Australia’s pullout, leaving Saudi Arabia unchallenged under international gyration rules confining flings to Asia/ Oceania.
Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International blamed the Clifford Chance evaluation for forgetting migratory losses over 50 reported in 2025 construction spots and freedom of expression checks, where twittering advocacy leads to imprisonment. A common statement from 21 associations post-award labeled it a” moment of great peril,” demanding FIFA halt medications absent reforms like kafala invalidation and death penalty doldrums. Norway’s confederation handed the sole FIFA opposition, citing governance voids, while diaspora voices like Lina Alhathloul reprobated superficial stakeholder engagement banning displaced groups like the Huwaitat lineage.
The role of sportswashing
Saudi Arabia’s investment in sport is widely viewed as an attempt to sportswash its international image. Hosting the World Cup would provide a grand stage to project a facade of reform and modernization while ongoing war crimes and abuses are left unaddressed. This tactic exploits the global popularity of football to sanitize a reputation deeply tarnished by violence and repression. Sportswashing risks distracting global attention from critical issues such as the famine-induced deaths in Yemen and the Kingdom’s relentless assault on freedom of expression domestically.
Calls for boycott and ethical responsibility
Human rights organizations, activists, and international stakeholders have intensified calls for a boycott of Saudi Arabia’s 2034 FIFA World Cup hosting, citing the Kingdom’s documented war crimes in Yemen such as airstrikes killing over 19,000 civilians since 2015 and systematic domestic violations including 302 executions in 2025 amid unfair trials reliant on torture.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and 21 other groups, including Saudi diaspora organizations like ALQST, migrant worker unions from Nepal and Kenya, and fans’ representatives, issued a joint statement on December 11, 2024, labeling FIFA’s confirmation a “moment of great danger” for human rights, urging an immediate halt to preparations without enforceable reforms like abolishing the kafala system and moratoriums on executions. These advocates argue that proceeding legitimizes a regime responsible for Yemen’s blockade-induced famine affecting 21 million people and domestic repression, such as the flogging of activist Raif Badawi and arbitrary detentions of women’s rights defenders.
Norway’s football federation was the sole FIFA member to oppose the bid in December 2024, decrying the rushed, non-competitive process that limited scrutiny after Australia’s withdrawal, while May 2025 legal complaints by experts Mark Pieth, Stefan Wehrenberg, and Rodney Dixon accused FIFA of breaching its human rights policies by failing to ensure compliance in areas like freedom of expression, migrant rights, and judicial independence.
Saudi Arabia’s deep involvement in war crimes
Saudi Arabia’s deep involvement in war crimes in Yemen paired with its domestic human rights abuses presents a significant moral challenge that FIFA has failed to address in its awarding of the 2034 World Cup. The Kingdom’s conduct, implicating thousands of civilian deaths and the curtailment of freedoms at home, starkly contrasts the humanitarian values sports aim to celebrate. The decision to grant Saudi Arabia this honor risks normalizing impunity and offers a platform for sportswashing that imperils the integrity of global sport. Boycotting Saudi Arabia’s World Cup bid is a critical response to uphold human rights and hold FIFA accountable.