Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday the world still had heard his call for peace despite Fifa’s decision to decline to allow a video message to be broadcast ahead of the football World Cup final in Qatar.

Zelensky had asked for the video to be broadcast, including his call to hold a global peace conference to help resolve the war triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Ukrainian soccer players and other officials had publicised the message, he said.

“Even though Fifa blocked this message from being aired at the stadium before the final game in Qatar, the world still heard our appeal,” Zelensky said in his nightly video address to Ukrainians.

The World Cup, he said, was the essence of striving to win. “But the competition is on the playing field and not on the battlefield.

The worst that can happen is a red card — and not the red button,” he said, alluding to the possibility of a nuclear strike.

CNN reported on Friday that Zelensky had asked Fifa to let him share a message of peace before the final.

“We offered (a) peace formula to the world. Absolutely fair. We offered it because there are no champions in war, there can be no draw,” Zelensky said in a video issued by his office.

Fifa rejects any political messages in organising WorldCup matches.