Crystal Palace fans protest against Europa League ejection
Palace qualified for this season's Europa League courtesy of their shock win over Manchester City in the FA Cup final in May, which secured a historic first major trophy.
But they missed a March 1 deadline to demonstrate that American co-owner John Textor, also a part-owner at Lyon, had no control or influence over more than one club in the same competition.
UEFA's Club Financial Control Body (CFCB) decided Textor's interest in both clubs meant only one could enter the Europa League, with Lyon's higher league position edging out Palace.
Palace are weighing up their options in response and admitted they could appeal UEFA's verdict at the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Textor has agreed to sell his shareholding in Palace to New York Jets owner Woody Johnson. He has also stepped down as Lyon president, but remains co-owner.
Nottingham Forest are expected to replace the Eagles in the Europa League after finishing seventh in the Premier League last season although this has not yet been confirmed by UEFA.
Palace chairman Steve Parish declared it 'a bad day for football' and 'a terrible injustice' after the club were demoted to the Conference League having fallen foul of UEFA's rules on multi-club ownership.
A petition urging UEFA to reconsider and reinstate Palace back in the Europa League has been signed by more than 3,000 people since being created on Friday.
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NBC News
9 minutes ago
- NBC News
Coca-Cola dodges after Trump says soda will switch back to cane sugar
President Donald Trump on Wednesday said Coca-Cola in the U.S. will begin to be made with cane sugar, but the company did not explicitly say that was the case when asked later about the president's claim. In a Truth Social post Wednesday afternoon, Trump said he had been speaking to Coca-Cola about using cane sugar in the sodas sold in the U.S., and that the company agreed to his idea. "This will be a very good move by them — You'll see. It's just better!" Trump wrote in the post. But Coca-Cola did not commit to the change when asked later by NBC News about Trump's social media post. "We appreciate President Trump's enthusiasm for our iconic Coca-Cola brand," a company spokesperson said in a statement. "More details on new innovative offerings within our Coca-Cola product range will be shared soon." It remains unclear whether Coca-Cola agreed to Trump's cane sugar proposal, or if the beloved soda will still be made with corn syrup going forward. The Trump administration's Make America Healthy Again initiative, named for the social movement aligned with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has pushed food companies to alter their formulations to remove ingredients like artificial dyes. Coca-Cola produced for the U.S. market is typically sweetened with corn syrup, while the company uses cane sugar in some other countries, including Mexico and various European nations. The company in 1984 announced it was going to 'significantly increase' the amount of corn syrup it was using in its U.S. products, the New York Times reported at the time. Coca-Cola said it would use corn syrup to sweeten bottled and canned Coke, as well as caffeine Coke, but left itself 'flexibility' to use other sweeteners like sugar or high-fructose corn syrup, the Times reported. Kennedy has been critical of the amount of sugar consumed in the American diet and has said that updated dietary guidelines released this summer will advise Americans to eat "whole food." Trump has been known to enjoy Coca-Cola products. Diet Coke button, which allows the president to order the soda on demand, has joined him in the Oval Office for both of his terms.
Spectator
an hour ago
- Spectator
The crimes of Cecil Rhodes were every bit as sinister as those of the Nazis
This is a brave and learned book. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the history of Africa; who has taken sides in the recent quarrel about 'Rhodes Must Fall', in Oxford or other parts of the world; or who wants to entrench themselves in contrary positions in our apparent 'culture wars'. It is the biography of a vicar's son, born in Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire in 1853, who went as a teenager to Africa to join his elder brother who'd bought a plot of land in Natal. One day, walking past a stream by the side of a field, he noticed some pebbles gleaming especially brightly. They were diamonds. By the time Cecil Rhodes enrolled as an undergraduate at Oriel College, Oxford, aged 20, he had an annual income of £23,000 – the equivalent of about £1.5 million today. Money is power, and the diamond and gold mines of South Africa made Rhodes and his pals prodigiously rich. Today's billionaires, such as Elon Musk, may make half-hearted attempts to involve themselves in government, but compared with Rhodes they are lightweights. Here was a man whose fantastic wealth and power mania awoke greed in others – among them Alfred Beit and Natty Rothschild – and who eventually encouraged the Liberal imperialists and Colonial Office in London to embrace the dream of taking over an entire continent. We are still living with the consequences. I know that some Spectator readers think it amusing to see Rhodes as a bit of a hero – or at least scorn those who protested outside the building on the High Street in Oxford adorned by his statue. He was certainly one of the greatest benefactors the university ever had. In his will endowing the Rhodes scholarships he specified that 'no student shall be disqualified for election on account of his race or religion'. William Kelleher Storey explains that, although these are the words, Rhodes probably meant by 'race' simply American, British or German (he set aside three scholarships for Germans) and that he did not necessarily envisage giving money to Africans to study at Oxford. He was entirely deaf to Gladstone's words at the beginning of the First Boer War: 'Remember the rights of the savage, as we call him.' Rhodes was unapologetically racist. Oxford was where his imperialist aspirations flowered. He heard John Ruskin lecture and it made him want England to 'found colonies as fast and as far as she is able'. Reading William Winwood Reade's The Martyrdom of Man when an undergraduate was crucial. Rhodes kept a copy beside him till his death. 'That book – which asserted the superiority of Europeans to Asians and Africans as a matter of scientific fact derived from the evolutionists – has made me what I am,' he wrote. Europeans, he sincerely believed, had the most highly developed intellects: 'Let me ask those who admit the development of all civilised people from a savage state… how it is that Europeans have advanced, while others have remained in a savage state.' The 'Hindoos' and Chinese were cited as being obvious examples. The Colonialist is primarily a work of history, which places Rhodes's actions and achievements in the story of Africa. It is not really a personal book, and I wanted much more about the man himself. For example, he and Leander Starr Jameson (of the celebrated raid) probably had some kind of relationship, but because Storey can find no evidence for Rhodes's homosexuality he does not reflect on it. Rhodes's desire to connect the whole of Africa from the Cape to Cairo and to make it all British is described in meticulous detail. And it was to this cause that he devoted his time and money – from his first discovery of diamonds in his brother's streams to his last days, when he was richer than almost anyone else in the British Empire. By then he was the director of several gold and mining companies and in a position to bribe tribal elders, kings and chieftains with arms and cash to allow him to create a whole new country: Rhodesia. Women play almost no part, and you can't help feeling that the whole story is essentially gay (though I still can't explain why this is so obvious on every page). Open-pit mining for diamonds was catastrophically dangerous, as well as being hideously hard work. But when African labourers fell to their deaths in landslides they were deemed stupid for not understanding the warnings bellowed at them in a language they did not speak. The book astutely reminds us that neither Rhodes nor his American mining engineer and sidekick Gardner Fred Williams had any idea of what life was like in the mines from which they made their millions. Workers would be strip-searched before returning home in case they had stolen a single gemstone, or kept totally naked in corrals for four or five days and then subjected to enemas. Rhodes pressed on from what is now South Africa to take possession of the territories of modern Zambia and Zimbabwe which for decades bore his name – north and south Rhodesia. And it was he who egged on Jameson to launch his raid on the Transvaal in 1895. The attempt to topple Paul Kruger, the Boer leader, was responsible for the Second Boer War, in which Lord Kitchener behaved with unforgettable brutality towards the Boers, exposing them to scorching heat in concentration camps – that British invention – and killing thousands of civilians. Storey's difficulty is that of any historian of European or American background approaching this subject. The Colonial Office and Queen Victoria were initially doubtful about the Rudd Concession of 1888, whereby King Lobengula of Matabeleland supposedly agreed to concede Bulawayo to the British in exchange for guns and money. But even if they doubted the legitimacy of these arrangements, and were prepared to prosecute Jameson for his undoubtedly illegal raid, the British government and their monarch were in the end willing to fight a war to defend the principle which ruled the piratical Rhodes's life. This was that Africa should not be in the hands of the Dutch, the Portuguese or the Germans – and certainly not the Africans. The continent was far better off being administered by British boys who had been to boarding schools and read Rider Haggard. Rhodes's influence, based on gold and diamonds, turned the morally nuanced British nation and Empire, which like most institutions was a mixture of good and evil, into a brigand state. And so the British persuaded themselves that they were entitled to own and plunder Africa, and that such greedy dishonesty was a sign of their moral superiority to the inhabitants. This insanity can largely be attributed to the propensity of suddenly acquired wealth to drive the possessor mad. Rudyard Kipling was a great writer, but his enthusiasm for Rhodes's vision for Africa was deluded. This cannot be a matter of opinion, like taking sides when dis-cussing Charles I vs Oliver Cromwell in the English Civil War. Those who scream with rage against Rhodes and his legacy are simply right and those who try to defend him and what he did are simply wrong. Being a wishy-washy white man of a certain age, I want to add, of course, that this is not a reason why Rhodes Must Fall – if by that is meant not just removing his effigies but seeking to erase his memory. We need to know the history – which is so punctiliously told in this book. It has never been related before in such detail, or with such impartiality, or awareness of the rage which the very name of Rhodes inspires in African hearts. I am glad I'm not a Fellow of Oriel, or Warden of Rhodes House in Oxford, having to work out what to say to the Rhodes Must Fall contingent. Much of Oriel's wealth and the very existence of Rhodes House derive from crimes every bit as sinister as those perpetrated by the Third Reich.
Spectator
an hour ago
- Spectator
Ukrainians have lost faith in Zelensky
Donald Trump this week boosted Ukraine's air defences with new Patriot batteries, threatened Vladimir Putin with sanctions if he does not agree to a ceasefire, and even reportedly gave tacit approval to more Ukrainian strikes on Moscow. Trump's newfound support for Ukraine is a welcome lifeline. The question is whether his help will be enough to stop Russia's relentless attacks before Ukraine is engulfed in a critical military, political and social crisis that threatens to destroy it from within. Putin chose war over peace this spring because his spies and generals told him that Ukraine is on the brink of collapse. Alarmingly, they may be right. Ukraine is running out of fighting men, its frontline soldiers are exhausted and US military support has narrowed to focus on air defence. The Kyiv government is racked by corruption scandals and purges, public faith in their future and in their leaders is tanking and pressure to make peace at almost any price is growing. In many ways the most remarkable thing about the conflict is that Ukraine still fights on despite the merciless and titanic punishment that Russia has meted out on its soldiers, civilians and infrastructure. 'If the war continues soon there will be no Ukraine left to fight for,' one former senior official in Zelensky's administration tells me. They now believe their former boss is 'prolonging the war to hold on to power'. Even once-staunch pro-Zelensky cheerleaders such as Mariia Berlinska, head of the Aerial Reconnaissance Support Centre, a prominent Ukrainian volunteer movement, express despair. 'We are hanging over the abyss,' Berlinska said recently. 'Ukraine is an expendable pawn in an American game… Trump, Putin, Xi [will] spend us like small change if they need to.' Ukrainian morale, admirably high for much of the war, is collapsing. Back in October 2022, even after six months of violence and bloodshed, 88 per cent of Ukrainians believed that they would be a 'flourishing country inside the EU' within a decade. Now 47 per cent think that 'Ukraine will be a depopulated country with a ruined economy'. A separate survey found that 70 per cent of Ukrainians also believe their leaders are using the war to enrich themselves. Nothing is more corrosive to wartime morale than the idea that a nation's leaders are stealing as its people fight and die. 'Corruption kills and loses wars,' says Kyrylo Shevchenko, a former head of Ukraine's Central Bank, who is in exile in Austria after being charged with corruption in 2023. In recent weeks, Ukraine has been engulfed in corruption scandals. Two deputy prime ministers, minister for national unity Oleksiy Chernyshov and minister for reconstruction Oleksandr Kubrakov, have been investigated for embezzlement and treason. Zelensky has also repeatedly tried to sack Major General Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine's military intelligence, allegedly because of his growing popularity. Only pressure from the US embassy in Kyiv prevented the sacking of one of Ukraine's most popular generals, a serving senior European diplomat with knowledge of the case tells me. The recent spate of arrests and searches against Zelensky loyalists suggest serious political infighting at the heart of the Kyiv government – and also a reckless readiness to take down prominent critics both inside and outside the state, regardless of how it looks to the outside world. Perhaps the most shocking of all the recent arrests is that of Vitaliy Shabunin, one of Ukraine's most prominent anti-corruption activists, who has been charged with evading military service and fraud. Shabunin, the chair of the Anti-Corruption Action Centre executive board and a leading watchdog of military corruption, attacked the government soon after this arrest. 'Taking advantage of the war, Volodymyr Zelensky is taking the first but confident steps towards corrupt authoritarianism,' Shabunin wrote on Telegram. He has been a critic of a proposed law on defence procurement that would allow the Defence Ministry to exempt chosen companies implementing government contracts from criminal liability. At the same time, the administration has blocked the appointment of a new independent head of the Bureau of Economic Security, a powerful law enforcement agency with an uncomfortable track record of prosecuting Zelensky's political opponents. 'Ukraine has two enemies, two Vladimirs: Zelensky and Putin,' says a former Ukrainian cabinet minister, once a strong Zelensky supporter. 'Putin is destroying Ukraine from [the] outside, but Zelensky is destroying it from within by destroying its will to fight and its morale. Human rights are being trampled on, there is pressure against political opponents, rich and influential people who could support opposition are being expropriated and opposition media is silenced. And the irony is that this Putinification of Ukraine is being funded by the West.' Under the terms of a wartime state of emergency, more than 5,000 Ukrainians have come under sanctions and had their property frozen. The measure, first invented to prevent Russia-connected politicians, media groups and oligarchs from influencing Ukrainian politics, is now widely used to silence opponents of the regime, say critics, as well as to police the media. 'Sanctions have led to the closure of three YouTube channels belonging to Zelensky's critics in the past month,' says Shevchenko. 'Censorship often shields authoritarian leaders, and unchecked power breeds dictatorship.' Zelensky's term of office formally expired in May last year. While many argue it's unfeasible to hold elections in wartime, there is frustration that Zelensky has exiled key potential opponents and imprisoned and sanctioned others. 'In May 1940 Churchill invited the leader of the opposition Attlee to be his deputy and united all of parliament in one government,' notes opposition MP Oleksiy Goncharenko. 'Zelensky has done the opposite, he is holding on to power by all means possible.' Goncharenko sparked controversy by comparing Zelensky to Kim Jong-un and Ukraine to North Korea. Meanwhile, resentment, resistance and anger are rising at aggressive measures taken by the authorities to press-gang military-age men into the army – a process known as 'busification'. Unlike the Russian army, which is made up of contract soldiers, Ukraine has instituted full mobilisation of men over 26 not engaged in vital civilian work. Ukraine's social media is filled with daily videos of men being bundled into vans by recruitment officers, sometimes at gunpoint. Yet many of those forcibly recruited seem to have little desire to fight. In the first six months of this year, Ukraine's Prosecutor's Office reported that it had opened 107,672 new criminal cases for desertion. Since 2022 some 230,804 such criminal cases have been instigated, suggesting that more soldiers have deserted the Ukrainian army than there are fighting men in today's British, French and German armies combined. Those who remain at the front are exhausted. Mobilised Ukrainian soldiers serve until the end of hostilities, meaning that some have been fighting continuously for three-and-a-half years. A draft law releasing military personnel from service after 36 months was squashed by the government last year for fear that the retiring personnel could not be replaced. No men aged 18 to 60 have been allowed to leave the country since February 2022 without special permission. Since the Russian invasion, more than 6.8 million Ukrainians have fled the country, with a further eight million internally displaced. That's equivalent to 40 per cent of its working-age population. Runaway inflation is impoverishing ever-larger swathes of the country. Today 8.8 million people in Ukraine are living below the poverty line, up from six million before the war. Last week governments and businesses gathered in Rome for the third annual Ukraine Recovery Conference. The centrepiece of the conference was meant to be the unveiling of a multibillion-dollar Ukraine recovery fund that US investment giant BlackRock has been working on since 2022. But earlier this year BlackRock announced that it was shuttering the fund 'due to a lack of interest'. Germany's Friedrich Merz, Italy's Giorgia Meloni and Poland's Donald Tusk were there to make the usual pledges of support. Yet in terms of concrete aid, the EU was able to rustle up just €2.3 billion – just a drop in the bucket compared with the World Bank's estimate of $524 billion to restore Ukraine's infrastructure. 'All of the political elite understands that Ukraine needs a new system of government to stabilise [the] situation,' says the former Zelensky cabinet minister. 'People want to stop living in fear. But instead of asking how to help a transition of power in Ukraine, the EU is closing its eyes.' Many of Zelensky allies, including some of the country's top ministers, fear that they could be prosecuted or exiled if they leave power. Zelensky's team have 'made many enemies' in Ukraine's political class, explains a senior European diplomat who attended the Rome conference. 'They fear that their future is exile, or jail' – which, in turn, only increases the 'temptation to line their pockets while they can'. Trump's newly announced Patriot package is welcome news. So are Europe's continued promises of unwavering support. But none of Ukraine's allies can really help with the country's chronic manpower shortage or with the deepening crisis of legitimacy that Zelensky faces. Most worrying of all, no outsiders can reverse the spiral of arrests of former regime loyalists, crackdown on opposition members and shutdown of media outlets that are doing so much to erode Ukrainians' faith in the war effort and in Zelensky's leadership.
