By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
The dispute over North Korea's refusal to allow the South Korean anthem and flag in their World Cup qualifier in Pyongyang next month may be submitted to FIFA for arbitration.
Cho Jung-yeon, vice president of South Korea's Korean Football Association (KFA), told reporters Wednesday that the football body will take the matter to FIFA should the North choose not to change its stance by the end of the week.
``We can't wait too much for North Korea. We will have to seek arbitration if the North refuses to change its stance by the end of the East Asian Football Championship," said Cho, on the sidelines of the four-nation tournament in Chongqing, China, that continues through Saturday.
``The March 26 match would be the second fixture for both teams in the World Cup qualifiers, and there isn't much time to adjust the issues over national anthems, flags and the entry of media members and football supporters," he said.
South Korea, looking for its seventh consecutive World Cup berth, is placed alongside North Korea, Jordan and Turkmenistan in the third stage of the Asian qualifying rounds and opened its campaign with a 4-0 drubbing of Turkmenistan earlier this month.
Its next opponent in the home-and-home tournament is North Korea, which comes off a 1-0 win over Jordan, and the March 26 match in Pyongyang would be the first time since 1990 that the two national teams play each other in the North's capital.
However, North Korea's reluctance in allowing the South to display its flag and play its national anthem at the match presents a possibility for the match to be played in a third country.
The North is also uneasy about allowing South Korean supporters to attend the match in Pyongyang.
As an alternative, the North suggested the South use the ``Korean Peninsula Flag," a white flag marked with a blue map of the peninsula, and the traditional Korean song of ``Arirang."
North and South Korea marched together under the peninsula flag and the Arirang song at the Doha Asian Games in 2006.
However, the KFA refused the North's offer.