The Uruguayan government has come to the aid of Liverpool striker Luis Suarez, declaring themselves to be fully supportive of their countryman.

 

Suarez has been slapped with an eight-match ban and £40,000 fine by the English Football Association for aiming a racist remark at Manchester United defender Patrice Evra.

 

Liverpool and the player have continued to maintain his innocence however, with the Reds team wearing t-shirts in support of Suarez before their 0-0 draw at Wigan Athletic.

 

And now further support has arrived from governmental level.

 

"This leaves us with a disagreeable feeling", Uruguay’s sports director Ernesto Irureta told Montevideo newspaper Ultimas Noticias.

 

"A sanction like this is absurd, out of place and absolutely exaggerated.

 

"What is more is that there is the story that the other sportsman (Evra) might have called Luis a sudaca", added Irureta, referring to an insulting Spanish name for South Americans.

 

"What is happening in Europe is a product of their problems and not a product of what happens among players and one of them concerns racism.

 

"We have a country with differences but a long way from those circumstances that occur in the Old Continent."

 

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