FIFA Suspends Spanish Soccer Federation Chief Involved in Post-Game Kiss

FIFA, the soccer world’s governing physique, stated on Saturday that it had provisionally suspended Luis Rubiales, president of Spain’s soccer federation, amid an investigation that he forcibly kissed a participant, Jennifer Hermoso, after Spain’s Women’s World Cup victory final Sunday.

In a assertion, FIFA stated that Mr. Rubiales can be suspended “from all football-related activities at national and international level” for an preliminary interval of 90 days, beginning Saturday. The physique additionally ordered each Mr. Rubiales and the soccer federation he chairs to chorus from contacting Ms. Hermoso.

Mr. Rubiales has insisted he did nothing mistaken to Ms. Hermoso, who stated she by no means consented to his actions however had confronted stress to publicly again Mr. Rubiales. Spain’s soccer federation threatened to sue Ms. Hermoso late on Friday to guard Mr. Rubiales’ repute.

Mr. Rubiales’s kiss on the Women’s World Cup medals ceremony final weekend in Australia — broadcast stay to hundreds of thousands — forged a pall over the Spanish staff’s celebrations, drawing consideration away from a proud nationwide second and towards a legacy of sexism scandals in Spanish soccer.