KEIR RADNEDGE REPORTS: Any vague Saudi Arabian hopes of muscling in on Qatar’s hosting of the 2022 World Cup finals have been cast into the Gulf by a report commissioned by a consortium of football governing bodies into television rights piracy.

For the past 18 months international football has been growing increasingly angry at seeing broadcast deals with Qatar’s beIN being undermined by the beoutQ pirating of major competitions such as the World Cup and Champions League in the Middle East and North Africa.

The Saudi-based Arabsat corporation has always denied involvement and the Saudi authorities have blocked any attempts at legal action from world federation FIFA, the Asian and European confederations (AFC and UEFA) plus English, French, German, Italian and Spanish leagues.

However a report the group commissioned has confirmed Arabsat’s role which is understood to be with the approval of the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and their allies in the ongoing economic and political blockade of Qatar.

Political advisers believe the Saudis wished either to force Qatar to share the World Cup or be stripped of the finals by angry sponsors and TV corporations. The result of the piracy has been only to ensure the exact opposite.

Some media commentators have suggested that the Saudi football federation should be suspended from FIFA and its national team thus expelled from the World Cup qualifiers. However there are no grounds within the world federation statutes for such action since this is a commercial rather than a direct sports adminstration issue.

Anger at Saudi aquiescence is clear from a statement co-ordinated by FIFA, saying: “The report [by MarkMonitor] confirms without question that beoutQ’s pirate broadcasts have been transmitted using satellite infrastructure owned and operated by Arabsat.

“We have been frustrated in our attempts to pursue a formal copyright claim against beoutQ in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and, while we have received reports that beoutQ transmissions are currently disrupted, we nevertheless call on Arabsat and all other satellite providers to stop (and going forward agree to refrain from) providing a platform for piracy, which harms not just legitimate licensees, fans and players but also the sports that it abuses.

“Cutting off its access to transmission services would be a major step in the fight to stop beoutQ. We all, individually and collectively, remain committed to bringing an end to international sports piracy.”

The Saudi-led coalition, whose action against Qatar has proved futile thus far, considered that one strand of their attack should target the state’s World Cup hosting. One tactic was upsetting the sports rights market in which beIN plays a significant and lucrative role.

A number of promotional agencies have been commissioned to plant anti-Qatar stories in the international media.

Joint statement:

Joint statement by FIFA, the AFC, UEFA, the Bundesliga, LaLiga, Lega Serie A, Ligue 1 and the Premier League on the publication of an investigative report into the operations of beoutQ

As rights holders of globally followed sports events, whose intellectual property rights have been breached on a systematic and widespread basis by the pirate broadcaster known as beoutQ, we have commissioned a leading industry body, MarkMonitor, to conduct research and produce a detailed and independent technical analysis of beoutQ’s operations.

The report confirms without question that beoutQ’s pirate broadcasts have been transmitted using satellite infrastructure owned and operated by Arabsat. The contents of the report are today being published in full on the rights holders’ websites to provide transparency about the facts of the case and to demonstrate the seriousness with which we, as global rights holders, view this issue. 

As previously communicated, we have been frustrated in our attempts to pursue a formal copyright claim against beoutQ in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and, while we have received reports that beoutQ transmissions are currently disrupted, we nevertheless call on Arabsat and all other satellite providers to stop (and going forward agree to refrain from) providing a platform for piracy, which harms not just legitimate licensees, fans and players but also the sports that it abuses.

Cutting off its access to transmission services would be a major step in the fight to stop beoutQ. We all, individually and collectively, remain committed to bringing an end to international sports piracy.

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