Iran forbids its sports teams from traveling to 'hostile' countries

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Iran forbids its sports teams from traveling to 'hostile' countries

2026-03-27 08:51 Last Updated At：09:10

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran has banned its sports teams from traveling to countries it considers “hostile," Iranian state TV reported Thursday ahead of Tractor FC's scheduled soccer game in Saudi Arabia.

The ban announced by Iran’s Ministry of Sports in Tehran didn't mention the World Cup which starts June 11 in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

The ministry's statement singled out the Tractor game against Shabab Al Ahli of Dubai that was set to be played in Saudi Arabia. It's a playoff game in the Asian Champions League Elite.

“The presence of national and club teams in countries that are considered hostile and are unable to ensure the security of Iranian athletes and team members is prohibited until further notice,” it said.

The Iran war has impacted the region, with nearly every country in the Middle East sustaining damage from missile hits, drone strikes or shrapnel.

Tractor's playoff game in Saudi Arabia was the result of the Asian Football Confederation's draw Wednesday to determine the quarterfinal pairings, a day after announcing that the western zone playoffs that were postponed because of the war in the Middle East have been rescheduled for April 13-14 in Jeddah.

The Saudi city is also slated to host the tournament quarterfinals, semifinals and final from April 16-25, with organizers setting the dates and hoping for peace in the region.

The Iranian ministry added that the soccer federation and clubs “will be responsible for notifying the Asian Football Confederation of this matter in order to relocate the games.”

The Iranian ambassador in Mexico City has said the country was negotiating with FIFA to move Iran’s three group-stage matches from the United States to Mexico after U.S. President Donald Trump discouraged the team from attending the 48-nation tournament, citing safety concerns.

Last week, however, FIFA President Gianni Infantino further dampened Iran’s attempts to move its World Cup matches, saying global soccer’s governing body wants the tournament “to go ahead as scheduled.”

Iranian government and soccer officials have said they do not want to boycott the World Cup but that it is not possible for the national team to come to the U.S. because of military attacks on the country by Israel and U.S. since Feb. 28.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

US book critics honor Nobel laureate and South Korean novelist Han Kang

A novel by Nobel laureate Han Kang, Karen Hao's examination of artificial intelligence and OpenAI (the company behind ChatGPT) and a memoir by the author Arundhati Roy were among the winners Thursday of the annual National Book Critics Circle awards.

Han's "We Do Not Part,” translated by e.yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris, addresses a 1948-1949 uprising on Jeju, an island south of the Korean mainland, in which thousands of people were killed.

Heather Scott Partington, who chaired the awards' fiction committee, described the novel as “a work of blinding melancholy, bleak weather, and murmuring syntax” and said it "lingers like an atmospheric and arresting dream.”

The lifetime achievement award went to author and journalist Frances FitzGerald, whose 1972 "Fire in the Lake” was an early and prescient take on the Vietnam War.

NPR and PBS were presented with the achievement award honoring institutions that have made significant contributions to book culture.

"At a time when some question the value of public, service-minded media, we salute PBS and NPR for all you have done for both book culture and American democracy,” said Jacob M. Appel, who chaired the selection process for the award.

Winners of other categories:

— Hao's “Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI” won for nonfiction.

— Roy's “Mother Mary Comes to Me” won for autobiography.

— Alex Green's “A Perfect Turmoil: Walter E. Fernald and the Struggle to Care for America’s Disabled” won for biography.

— Kevin Young's “Night Watch” won for poetry.

— “Sad Tiger” by Neige Sinno and translated by Natasha Lehrer won the translation prize honoring both the author and translator.

The National Book Critics Circle was founded in New York in 1974 and consists of more than 850 critics and editors. Its annual awards honor the best books published in the past year in the United States.