Pyunik Tried to Guard Football Players and Fans from Abrupt Incidents

PanARMENIAN.Net - Pyunik, Armenia's leading football club on Thursday refused to play against a team from Azerbaijan in the semi-final of an annual soccer tournament held in Moscow, citing the wish to avoid political motives and the organizers' failure to guarantee the security of its players and fans. Pyunik vice-president, Karen Harutyunyan, claimed that his players heard threats to their life from Azerbaijani fans present at the Yerevan side's Wednesday night game with Ukraine champions Shakhter Donetsk.



In Harutyunyan's words, it was known that members of both Azeri and Armenian communities of Russia are going to repeat past year incidents in Olympiyskiy stadium. "Failing to receive appropriate written guarantees, the management of the Pyunik club decided not to participate in the game in order not to politicize it and to avoid any provocation with unpredictable and dangerous consequences for fans, players and members of the Armenian community," he stated. He also noted the tournament was not properly organized this year. "We believe the fans, Commonwealth Cup organizers, football federations of participant states and organizers, as well as the leaders of the Football Federation of Armenia will take the Club decision with understanding," the Pyunik FC Vice-President said.



Meanwhile, the Russian Football Union (RFU) "regretted and was puzzled" with Pyunik decision. A RFU statement says "actions like that do not honor football, which is called to unite and not to divide sportsmen, fans, countries and peoples." "Knowing the unsolved issues between Armenia and Azerbaijan the RFU and the organization committee of the Commonwealth Cup, held under the FIFA aegis, provided written security guarantees to the Armenian club leaders," the statement says.

However, in spite of the RFU guarantees, Armenian football players nevertheless refusing from the game show the guarantees were left on the paper.





Trying to prove their case the tournament organizers scored technical defeat to Pyunik 3:0 in favor of Baku Neftchi, as they considered the refusal of the Armenian team "an insufficiently good reason." Moreover, the RFU stated that "the Pyunik demarche will doubt expediency of invitation of that club to next Commonwealth Cup."