Putin Criticizes U.S. Department of Justice for Prosecuting FIFA Officials

Wednesday's indictments of top FIFA officials shook the international soccer community as the United States Department of Justice charged executives and senior officials with racketeering and money laundering. Vladimir Putin commented on the indictments on Wednesday night, criticizing the United States for acting outside its own territory.

In his speech on Russian state television, Putin alluded to previous efforts by the U.S. to exact justice outside of North America. Such examples included Edward Snowden and Julian Assange. "We know the United States’ position on the former N.S.A. agent Snowden, who uncovered illegal acts by the United States around the globe," said Putin. " Everyone, including Europe, is talking about this but nobody wants to give him asylum, guarantee his safety, nobody wants to quarrel with their partners, their old partners."

Putin called the DoJ indictments a "flagrant violation of the operating principles of international organizations," and "another blatant attempt by the United States to extend its jurisdiction to other states."

Russia has been selected to host the 2018 World Cup and Qatar the 2022 World Cup. Swiss prosecutors announced that they will investigate the bids by the countries and the awarding of the World Cups to those countries for the coming tournaments. FIFA, however, has stated that it will not change the 2018 and 2022 World Cup hosts.

The U.S. Department of Justice took the lead in prosecuting the FIFA officials and executives. Though most of the illegal activity took place outside of the United States and most of the indicted are not American, the money involved traveled through U.S. banks. The DoJ therefore claimed a right to investigate and prosecute.

The case with FIFA is not the first time the organization was questioned for possible fraud. Previously, Michael J. Garcia of the U.S. investigated the awarding of the Qatar and Russian World Cups. His report stated that there was not enough evidence to declare the Russian bid a fraud, but also stated that there was a severe lack of documents made available for the investigation.