The leadership of FIFA has always had a talent for mistaking theatrics for virtue. Under its president, Gianni Infantino, the organisation has elevated that habit into a new low with its latest contribution to global farce. It has decided to drape a peace prize around the neck of Donald Trump. One almost admires the audacity. Only FIFA could look at a man who treats conflict as a performance art and conclude that what the world needs most is his benediction in the language of peace.

Infantino has spent years polishing his image as the grand impresario of world football. He presides over an empire where money is the first principle and ethics are a regrettable afterthought. He now appears eager to burnish that empire by associating it with American power, even if the chosen avatar of that power is a man whose public life has been a long sermon on division and the antithesis of harmony. Trump has branded foes, mocked allies, debased civic culture and treated truth as a negotiable inconvenience. Trump has spent years inflaming racial hostility, threatening political opponents with retribution and praising violence as if it were a civic virtue.........

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