Casey to boycott Saudi event again over human rights abuses

PAUL CASEY insists he will not play in a European Tour event in Saudi Arabia next month, with Amnesty International calling on stars to promote human rights during big sporting events there.

UNICEF ambassador Casey boycotted the tournament in the Kingdom last January, which was held three months after the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Phil Mickelson attracted strong criticism this week for agreeing to play at the $3.5million event after Tiger Woods had turned down a $3m appearance fee to compete.

Ryder Cup star Casey, right, said: “I got 100 per cent positive feedback [last January] but I wasn’t doing it for the feedback. I wasn’t doing it for ratings. I was doing it because it was my belief.

“It’s something I do not want to talk about much – me being away is loud enough.

“You can assume correctly that I won’t be going there in January.” As well as the Anthony Joshua fight tomorrow, Saudi Arabia is due to stage a tennis tournament and the first two rounds of the new Formula E season. There are also talks about staging an F1 Grand Prix in 2021. Amnesty call the staging of such events “sports washing”, where regimes try to “buy positive PR”. Felix Jakens, UK Head of

Campaigns at the organisation, is not calling for stars to snub the competitions.

But he said: “Players need to do research to understand the context and be prepared to speak on human rights issues.

“A well-chosen remark or social media post ... would be an important reminder to the Saudi authorities their human rights abuses aren’t going unnoticed.”