UEFA continued its support for the Somali referee, Omar Artan Abdulkader, following the incident he faced last June, which led to his exclusion from officiating matches in the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
US authorities had denied Omar Artan entry into their territory due to a visa issue, prompting the FIFA Referees Committee to remove him from the list of referees selected to officiate World Cup matches, sparking considerable controversy.
UEFA invited Artan to participate in its annual seminar for the continent's top referees, amid an undeclared confrontation with FIFA.
This move came just days after UEFA assigned Artan to officiate the European Super Cup match held on August 12 in Austria, where Paris Saint-Germain claimed the title against Aston Villa.
The Spanish newspaper Mundo Deportivo noted that selecting the Somali referee to officiate the match is one of the clearest indicators of UEFA's support for him, especially after Artan was excluded from World Cup competitions due to a US decision.
The report added that UEFA's support for the African referee did not stop there, as UEFA decided to invite him to participate in the first refereeing seminar of the new season, which gathers Europe's elite referees in preparation for the start of European club competitions.
The seminar is scheduled to take place at UEFA headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, from August 31 to September 2, with the participation of the continent's most prominent referees.
The report concluded: "Artan will participate during the seminar in sessions alongside 35 referees from the Elite group, which includes UEFA's best officials, as well as 61 referees from the First Category group, representing the second tier in the European refereeing system."
The participant list also includes six Spanish referees: Alejandro Hernández Hernández, José María Sánchez Martínez, and Jesús Gil Manzano within the Elite group, in addition to Alberola Rojas, De Burgos Bengoetxea, and Juan Martínez Munuera in the First Category group.
The seminar is expected to include presentations of refereeing instructions and guidelines that UEFA will adopt before the start of the three European tournament competitions, with the Somali referee Omar Artan serving as a special guest at this refereeing gathering.
