UEFA has been accused of presenting “completely false” evidence in its own independent investigation into the 2022 Champions League final disaster, to protect its security unit, headed by the president's best friend, from criticism, as revealed by The Guardian.
The accusations were made by UEFA's then chief operating officer, Sharon Burkhalter-Lau, an event management specialist, who was second in command in planning the May 28 final at the Stade de France between Liverpool and Real Madrid. The match turned into a disaster where the security management operation failed and thousands of fans suffered from long static queues, rushes, dangerous police surveillance and attacks by local criminals.
UEFA appointed a panel of experts to review what happened and concluded that UEFA had “primary responsibility” because it did not monitor or supervise security plans and operations in Paris. However, experts did not point the finger at the security unit, whose role is to oversee security, but at Burkhalter-Lau's events division, because it had "sidelined" the unit.
As of 2021, the security unit is headed by Zeljko Pavlica, the best friend of UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin, and their relationship dates back decades to their lives at their home in Slovenia. Ceferin was Pavlica's best man at his wedding in 2018 and shortly after Ceferin became president of the Slovenian football association in 2011, Pavlica landed his first job in football, working for the association as a security officer. Pavlica's background is in personal bodyguard security, and some security professionals have questioned his level of experience and knowledge to qualify him for the top stadium security position in European football.
Burkhalter-Lau rejected as “completely false” UEFA evidence that the unit had been marginalized and emphasized that the problems had been caused mainly by the Paris police, over whom UEFA had no authority, and rejected accusations against his team: "The claim that Uefa Events... senior management sidelined UEFA's security unit is based on statements provided by UEFA that were false and concerted," he wrote.
Burkhalter-Lau alleged that Pavlica and his team failed to attend vital safety meetings, including in the run-up to the final, and failed to provide crucial information to the planning process.
In his testimony to experts, which was not included in the report, Pavlica said that on the night of the final he was in the VIP area almost the entire time. He said that he was not aware of the crisis until he was called to a meeting at 8:45 p.m., where Ceferin made the decision to delay the start of the match. This despite scenes that had been unfolding outside for hours, with Pavlica's own staff in the stadium control center and some of them raising the alarm from 5.19pm on the unit's WhatsApp group.
In Burkhalter-Lau's first memo, sent to Theodoridis in January, he wrote: “After the Paris final, we discussed that we must protect the security unit from the consequences.” But UEFA's evidence that Pavlica's unit had been sidelined was “false,” Burkhalter-Lau said.
"I now understand that there has been an agreed strategy to protect the security unit by establishing that all security matters would be communicated through project management, placing the blame for any perceived errors or omissions on the Tiziano team," he wrote in his memo, referring to Tiziano Gaier, a UEFA official in the Burkhalter-Lau division responsible for final operations. “Needless to say, it is completely false…”
The evidence “not only protects the security unit but effectively blames Titian's team,” Burkhalter-Lau wrote. Additionally, she accused UEFA's director of national associations, Zoran Lakovic, of presenting the same false claim as evidence that he personally gave to the panel.
Pavlica was fully briefed on all meetings, and any issues, including security, were to be reported and escalated through this system, and appropriate action would be taken, he said. But he alleged that Pavlica was deficient: “he has been invited to all the operations group meetings in the days leading up to the club final... however, he has not always attended. On several occasions, Tiziano has had to insist to Zeljko that the security unit be represented at these meetings.”
In May this year, shortly before the Champions League final in Istanbul, Burkhalter-Lau informed UEFA staff by email that she, one of the few women working in a senior position, was leaving the organization.
