Courtesy: ICC/X
The International Cricket Council (ICC) has reportedly refused the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to conduct the Champions Trophy tour in the disputed Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (PoK) region. After it was revealed that the PCB had scheduled for the Champions Trophy tour to go through the PoK cities, namely Skardu, Hunza, and Muzaffarabad, the ICC took swift action in terms of advising them to not send the coveted silverware there.
Just a day ago, after the Champions Trophy landed in Pakistan capital Islamabad, the PCB had announced that the silverware tour will happen in the cities namely Skardu, Murree, Hunza and Muzaffarabad, along with K2, the second tallest mountain in the world. At the same time, it was also revealed that the Champions Trophy will not be arriving in the three proposed venues of the tournament including Lahore, Karachi, and Rawalpindi.
PoK is a disputed region between India and Pakistan
The cities of Skardu, Hunza, and Muzaffarabad are in the PoK region, which is disputed between India and Pakistan, and therefore, ICC has reportedly stepped-in, as per the report from IANS, to tell the PCB to not send the Champions Trophy on tour. Moreover, the schedule of the highly anticipated tournament is not yet confirmed because of India’s refusal to travel to Pakistan to play in it.
With that, Najam Sethi, the former chairman of PCB, has slammed the ICC for not reprimanding the BCCI about their decision to not send their team to Pakistan. He was quoted as saying recently, “ICC is very weak and will never stand against BCCI because ICC depends on the revenue of BCCI. ICC is not ICC anymore. ICC is now BCCI because Jay Shah is set to become Chairman of ICC. In case, the Government of Pakistan contacts Narendra Modi then there is possibility that the latter would allow the Indian Cricket Team to visit Pakistan for Champions Trophy.”
