A World Cup full of memorable moments was also marked by exclusion, exploitation and unprecedented political meddling, writes JAMES NALTON
RUSSIAN hoaxers used edited recordings of ex-International Paralympic Committee (IPC) president Sir Philip Craven in an attempt to trick German investigative journalist Hajo Seppelt on the day Russia was suspended from February’s Winter Olympics.
Seppelt’s reports on the country’s state-sponsored doping programme have made him a target for Russian anger and he was accompanied again by security staff at the press conference in Lausanne which announced Russia’s Olympic ban on Tuesday.
But he had already received calls that morning from somebody who sounded like Craven and who wanted to talk about Russia.
On January 2 2014, PJ Harvey used her turn as guest editor of the Today programme to expose the realities of war, arms dealing and media complicity. The fury that followed showed how rare – and how threatening – such honesty is within Britain’s most Establishment broadcaster, says IAN SINCLAIR
MARK HAZELDEN criticises the Western narrative that the incident was an escalation of Russia’s confrontation with the West, given that Belarus, a Russian ally, warned Poland of off-course drones, and the drones were unarmed, cheap wooden decoys



