Soccer’s international governing body has no plans to ban Russia from this year’s World Cup despite calls from U.S. lawmakers to penalize the country for its aggression in Ukraine.

FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke said in a letter to a pair of U.S. senators that its rules and regulations do not apply to “entities outside the pyramidal structure of the game of football.” As such, Mr. Valcke suggested individual teams could not be banned from a competition because of actions by their parent states.