The Italian Journalists' Union accused Italy's elite league of trying to help Saudi Arabia improve their face by playing their game despite widespread human rights abuses, including the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
According to the association, the association helps Riyadh evade its "strict" gender-based laws, the brutal war in Yemen and repression of dissident voices, including the brutal killing of Jamal Khashoggi.
Time magazine said the reluctance of senior sports players to speak out against human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia raised accusations that they were complicit in the "sports laundry" of the Gulf state.
This came in response to Cristiano Ronaldo's success in his first Champions League win on Wednesday, after winning the win over Milan in the Italian Super Cup during the match in Jeddah.
The magazine said that the $ 8 million paid by Saudi Arabia for the right to hold each of the three Supercupas to be hosted over the next five years is the price of silence in the face of bombs that have been killing civilians in Yemen for four years. To face the recruitment of children, and in the face of the brutal murder of Khashoggi.
The journalists' union accused those involved in the deal of paying an important blow to human rights.