A complicated World Cup for Iran’s diaspora

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0:32Good morning from the Financial Times. Today is Friday, June 19th, and this is your FT News Briefing. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer could be one step closer to losing his job, and insurers are adapting to rising geopolitical tensions. Plus, this World Cup is complicated for Iranian Americans. Dissent against a political regime does not mean that you need to lose your connection to your nation. I'm Mark Filippino, and here's the news you need to start your day.

1:09Labor Party's Andy Burnham won the crucial Makerfield by-election early in the UK morning. That means the Greater Manchester Mayor will return to Parliament as an MP. Burnham has said he would challenge Starmer's leadership if elected. In his victory speech, Burnham said the seat of Makerfield had, quote, voted for change, adding that it will never be a stepping stone for me. Big emerging market currencies are having a hard time. Brazil's real, the Australian dollar, and the South Korean won all dropped more than 2 % against the dollar in the past month. The Norwegian krone is down more than 4%.

1:44And the tough times might continue. Markets are now pricing in a rise in U.S. interest rates. Kevin Warsh took a hawkish stance in his first meeting as Federal Reserve Chair this week. Higher interest rates make dollar assets more appealing and boost the currency, which makes emerging market currencies less attractive to investors.

2:08The Strait of Hormuz may start seeing lots of ship traffic again. That's because Iran and the U.S. signed an interim deal to pause the war for 60 days. But a leading insurance body is acknowledging that clashes between the world's biggest powers are becoming more routine. They're looking to change insurance policies so that fewer hostile acts are treated as, quote, acts of war. Lee Harris is the FT's insurance correspondent, and she broke this story. Hi, Lee. Hi, Mark. So I gather this all has to do with something called the five powers exclusion. Do me a favor, you know, explain what that is and why insurers are looking to change it.

2:46Exactly.

2:47Saffeya Ahmed: So this has been standard in insurance policies for planes and ships and commodities like oil since World War II. It's been around for decades. And it says that policies are canceled if war breaks out between any of these five powers, the U.S., China, Russia, the U.K., and France. And that's long been thought of as common sense. I mean, if war breaks out between any two of those countries, the thought has been all bets are off. But they're kind of eyeing the fact that at the moment there are more and more skirmishes or examples of low-grade conflict between some of these powers or their proxies.

3:29Saffeya Ahmed: And they want to make sure that that doesn't immediately or necessarily result in these policies being canceled. Okay, so that makes sense. What are the changes being considered? So they're considering adding a clause that would set out scenarios under which this exclusion wouldn't be automatically triggered. And they're looking specifically at things like cyber warfare, drone technology, and even undersea sabotage with submarines. A Chinese drone or a spy balloon flying into U.S. airspace wouldn't automatically mean that policies were canceled. The same thing would be true for a submarine that was nosing around undersea cables in UK waters.

4:18Saffeya Ahmed: Those both seem like plausible scenarios that could occur without necessarily indicating that there's a full-fledged war going on. So basically, it raises the threshold to cancel the insurance policy. Do I understand that correctly? Exactly. But doesn't this mean that insurers are taking on more risks themselves in the sense that they could have to pay out more? Yes, that's true. And you're entirely right. I mean, it's not every day you see insurers raising their hands to offer more coverage. Yeah. A couple of caveats are, number one, they're not sure that they're going to go ahead with this. So this is just something that's being discussed, but they're trying to avoid, frankly, a reputational risk for the industry.

5:03Saffeya Ahmed: They don't want a conflict occurring in the Baltic Sea or in the Gulf to result in an insurance policy on the other side of the world for an asset that wasn't immediately affected being canceled. So, Lee, what does this tell us about how insurers are viewing the state of play today? I think they're preparing for a world of kind of prolonged geopolitical conflict, more friction, more skirmishes, even between some of the most powerful countries in the world. And it tells us that even if this peace deal holds in Iran, and even if we're approaching some kind of settlement in Ukraine, insurers are basically preparing for a world where there's more conflict between the world's biggest economies.

5:47Lee Harris is the FT's insurance correspondent. Thanks, Lee.

5:51Saffeya Ahmed: Thank you.

5:58The Bank of England announced yesterday that it was holding interest rates at 3.75%. The BOE is keeping an eye on inflation, which is expected to pass 3 % in the next couple of months. One of the main things driving higher prices is the soaring cost of energy caused by the war in the Middle East. Like I mentioned, the U.S. and Iran signed a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz earlier this week, and oil prices have come down since then, but they're still higher than they were before the war. Traders expected the BOE to raise rates by a quarter point before the end of the year.

6:35Now, even though the U.S. and Iran have come to an agreement to end their conflict, there are still tensions, specifically on the soccer field or, you know, the football pitch. The Iranian team's World Cup matches are taking place on American soil. Our producer Safiya Ahmed has more. Earlier this week, Iran played their first match of the 2026 World Cup. It was against New Zealand. And Iranian Americans across the country were very proud to show up and support their team. Firstly, it feels unbelievable. This is their seventh World Cup and their fourth consecutive. Especially with everything going on geopolitically, I didn't even expect them to make it here.

7:13You know, Iran's gone through so much in the past since the revolution. So this is a day of celebration. And people were definitely celebrating. I attended a watch party in New York City for the game. And even though it was a pretty small room, the energy was electric, both during the match and even after the final whistle.

7:33One man was waving an Iranian flag. Others started dancing and cheering.

7:41But celebrations aside, this is a complicated World Cup for many Iranian Americans. Obviously, with the World Cup being hosted in the United States, Canada and Mexico, and with Iran's three games being here, this is a very unique occasion when the host country is at war with one of the competing teams. That's Shervin Zainalzadeh. He's part of the School of Politics and Global Studies at Arizona State University. Zain al-Zadeh says that Iran's football team has been received in a less than hospitable way. Iran were issued their visas at the last minute. However, some of the extended team and the extended administration staff still have not been given visas.

8:23And the visa issues are just the start of it. The Iranian team were due to have their training camp in Tucson, Arizona. But because of restrictions that have been placed on the Iranian team, not being able to stay overnight in the U.S., they've changed their training camp to Tijuana in Mexico, which means they now have to commute in and out of the U.S. for the three group matches and leave the same day. Here's how some of the Iranians I spoke to in New York feel about that treatment. It's very distressing to watch. It is also made to feel like a humiliation ritual. It's really upsetting that, you know, Iran having such a hospitable culture and being such a hospitable place is seeing such a poor reception in the U.S.

9:08But not every Iranian-American feels this way. Everyone, again, raise your flags high! Raise your flags high! Outside of the stadium where Iran played in Los Angeles this week, my colleague saw a small group of people demonstrating. And it wasn't about the war or the treatment of the players. We're here to protest against the team of Iran. Those people do not represent the Iranian people. They represent the Islamic Republic, but not the Iranian people. Zain al-Zadeh of Arizona State University says that these protesters see the team and the authoritarian government of Iran as pretty much one and the same.

9:54What they claim to be doing is not necessarily personally attacking the players, but they are using the extension of the squad as a voice that will be passed back to Tehran. They're voicing their dissent of a regime that has cracked down on protesters in recent months and also shut off the internet in Iran. They cannot directly engage with the Iranian government in Tehran as they are here in the United States, and probably many of them can never go back to Iran. I came to support my people in Iran to be their voice for freedom. Well, we've lost many, many young people in Iran uprising. Government of Iran killed so many of them.

10:36And the team that's representing the government is here today. It's fair to say, deep down in the hearts of the Iranian diaspora, they want to see the team do well. But their mind says, well, this is a team that represents a government or a system that they don't necessarily agree with. So they are torn. But many of these players, like anyone in the World Cup, these are professional footballers. They're not necessarily involved in politics, so it's a little bit unfair on them. One man that I spoke to in New York agrees with that sentiment. Do you have any complicated feelings when it comes to showing pride for your country at the same time as maybe disagreeing with a regime in power?

11:15Not particularly because I feel like I do it in the United States as well. Dissent against a political regime does not mean that you need to lose your connection to your nation. Maybe I don't love everything that happens in Iran, just like I don't love everything that happens in America. Now, there is a chance that the U.S. and Iran end up playing each other in this World Cup. And given the tensions between the two nations, I asked Zainal Zadeh what that matchup might look like. It could really set the precedent of what's to come by bringing together two adversaries in a football match. And I think it will be another opportunity for the players to distinguish themselves as sports people, not politicians.

11:55I predict they will stand hand in hand for a group photo. And it will send a very, very powerful message to over three billion people in the world that will be probably watching the World Cup. I'm Safia Ahmed reporting from New York City. Special thanks to the FT's sports editor, Josh Noble, for his reporting from Los Angeles. You can read more on all these stories for free when you click the links in our show notes. This has been your daily FT News Briefing. Check back next week for the latest business news. The FT News Briefing was produced this week by Safiya Ahmed, Sonia Hudson, Katya Kumkova, Fiona Simon, and Victoria Craig.

12:28I'm your editor, Mark Filipino. Our show is mixed by Alex Higgins and Kelly Gary. They'd help this week from Michaela Tendera, Peter Barber, Michael Lello, David Da Silva, and Gavin Coleman. Our intern is Colvin Miltonberg. Our executive producer is Topher Forges. Flo Phillips is the FT's global head of audio. And our theme song is by Metaphor Music.

12:48Thank you.

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