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Fifa castigated for rights abuses involving vendors [So. Africa]
FIFA, the world soccer governing body, should be held to account about its treatment of street vendors, many of whom have suffered loss of income during the World Cup, a leading global human rights campaigner said this weekend. Mary Robinson...said the move by Fifa to set up exclusion zones near the World Cup stadiums was a human rights issue that needed to be addressed...[She] said it was critical to devise a way to protect the rights of the street vendors and informal traders, particularly in the developing world, so they can continue to eke out a living, unhindered by the staging of such major events as the World Cup...Robinson questioned why Fifa would give priority to multinationals such as Coca-Cola just because they paid money to the soccer body but informal vendors were sidelined in the part of the world where street vending was a main source of income for a majority of people.