The Celtic Trust has asked Celtic to restore the season ticket rights for the Green Brigade after the club advised the supporters group yesterday afternoon that their tickets had been cancelled pending a review in which they outlined the reasons for the ban and opened the door to the nominated Green Brigade representatives to meet with the club to discuss the issues that the club have got.
The Celtic Trust today released the following statement on this very serious matter…
“The Trustees of the Celtic Trust wish to comment on the decision of Celtic PLC to withdraw, for an indefinite period, the season ticket rights of a section of the Celtic support.
“From the information now available on social media, it is abundantly clear to us that this action has been motivated by the the flying of Palestinian flags at Celtic Park in protest against the continuing wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinian civilians, including over 3000 children.
“This show of anger and solidarity with the Palestinian people was supported by thousands of Celtic supporters around the stadium and not for the first time. Why then was only one group singled out and targeted?
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“The facts, according to various communications from Celtic which are now freely circulating, are that the away ticket allocation for the Green Brigade was stopped because of alleged conduct issues at Feyenoord (19/9/23), Motherwell (30/9/23) and Lazio (4/10/23). The withdrawal of away tickets was not implemented for a full three weeks after the Lazio game for some reason, but we can only assume that this ‘punishment’ covered all the incidents up to that point.
“After that point the only games we have had were the Atletico Madrid home game on 25/10/23 and the Hibs away game (for which this group of fans were not allocated tickets) on 28/10/23. Further, we know that there were no Celtic travel stewards in the Hibs ground so Celtic can have no credible information about any misconduct at that ground. And that leaves the Atletico Madrid game….
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“On that basis, the Trustees are concerned that the action by Celtic, given the timing, is either politically motivated or motivated by an unwillingness to stand up to UEFA.
“We stand with the Green Brigade in their calls to end the genocide in Gaza – as do hundreds of thousands of people across the UK and across the world – and we call on Celtic to restore the season ticket rights of the Green Brigade immediately pending refreshed and open dialogue with the Green Brigade and other supporters’ groups.
“Further we ask Celtic to engage with all of the supporters’ organisations and CSCs on the issue of ‘offensive’ or ‘political’ displays with a view to representing those views to UEFA in the strongest possible terms.”