Moldova Bars Kosovar Croatian Football Club Player From Match

Moldova's Football Federation told BIRN on Friday that it was not aware of the situation with the Kosovar player for Croatian Dinamo Zagreb whose request for a Moldovan visa has been rejected.

"I don't know anything about any ban. It is the first time I hear about it. No one from Dinamo Zagreb contacted us in this regard," an official from the Moldovan Football Federation said.

Croatian media reported on Friday that Lirim Kastrati, a Kosovar player for Croatia's Dinamo Zagreb football club, will not be able to join his teammates for the Champions League qualifying play-offs match against Moldova's Sheriff Tiraspol on August 17 because the authorities there had not granted him a visa.

Moldova, which has its own separatist issues with breakway Transnistria, has not recognised Kosovo, which broke away from Serbia and declared its independence in 2008.

Moldova's Foreign Affairs Ministry indicated that the visa hold-up is related to its negative stance toward Kosovo's independence.

"This case probably falls into the framework of our laws regarding certain countries that Moldova does not recognize, including Kosovo," the ministry spokesperson, Daniel Voda, told BIRN.

Zagreb-based portal Index.hr reported that Dinamo Zagreb will address the issue to the European football governing body, UEFA, "to convince the Moldavans that politics has no place in sport".

The match is due on August 17 in Tiraspol, capital of the breakaway Moldovan region of Transnistria, with the second round due to be played on August 25 in Zagreb, Croatia.

Media in Croatia also quoted the Dinamo club management as expressing regret that Moldova had not accepted its request for a visa for the player.

"We are in intensive contact with the...