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FIFA investigates Switzerland players’ goal celebration, an Albanian nationalist gesture

The goal celebrations of two Switzerland players is drawing the attention of FIFA, which is investigating the gestures by the players who are of Albanian-Kosovan heritage.

Granit Xhaka and Xherdan Shaqiri, who grew up in Switzerland, celebrated with an eagle gesture in an apparent reference to the two-headed eagle on the Albanian flag. Each had scored in Switzerland’s 2-1 victory over Serbia, whose crackdown on the Albanian population was ended by NATO intervention in 1999.

Xhaka’s father was a political prisoner in Yugoslavia for 3 1/2 years spent three and a half years as a political prisoner in Yugoslavia.