SEOUL, March 7: Football’s world governing body FIFA has ruled that South Korea and North Korea must hold their March 26 World Cup qualifier in Shanghai, China officials said Friday.

The two Koreas were also asked to follow FIFA rules by singing their own national anthems and displaying their flags during the match, the (South) Korea Football Association (KFA) said in a statement.

The match was to take place in the North Korean capital Pyongyang and the North had suggested the two sides jointly adopt a neutral flag depicting the Korean Peninsula for the match, and play traditional Korean folk song “Arirang” beforehand.

South Korea, which wanted to have its flag and national anthem, decided to seek FIFA arbitration after both sides failed to settle the row at talks last month.

It was not known immediately whether North Korea accepted FIFA’s compromise on the site of the match venue.

South Korea has never been allowed to hoist its flag in any sports games in North Korea.

The two sides used a neutral flag during a friendly in Pyongyang in 1990, while South Korea has allowed the North to hoist its own flag and play its anthem when they met here.

The two Koreas are grouped with Turkmenistan and Jordan in their World Cup qualifying group.

In their first qualifiers, South Korea beat Turkmenistan 4-0 and North Korea defeated Jordan 1-0.

The communist North

and capitalist South have remained technically at war since the end of the 1950-1953 Korean conflict and neither nation officially recognises the other’s existence.—AFP