The League of Legends: Wild Rift EMEA Championship (WREC) for the CIS region has been canceled amid the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, WREC announced in a tweet today.
CIS is one of three regions in the WREC, with the other two being Europe and Turkey. The matches in the two remaining regions will remain unaffected and proceed as per schedule.
Riot Games will distribute the prize money for the CIS region among the remaining teams in the open qualifiers. The qualifier, which features teams like Unicorns of Love and VP. Prodigy, was ongoing when the invasion by Russia began on Feb. 24. Twelve teams were remaining, per Liquipedia, and the squads will now receive a share of an undisclosed prize pool.
The invasion has caused a humanitarian crisis in the Eastern European country. Earlier today, Riot pledged to donate $1 million to three non-profit organizations supporting humanitarian relief efforts in Eastern Europe. Besides Riot’s direct donation, all proceeds from battle pass sales between March 5 and 12 across VALORANT, Legends of Runeterra, Teamfight Tactics, and Wild Rift will be donated to support humanitarian efforts “in Ukraine and other affected areas.”
The WREC is the top-level of competitive Wild Rift in the EMEA region. The ongoing season one will culminate at the WREC Finals, which will happen as an offline event in Barcelona, Spain in May. Two teams from each of the three regions—Europe, Turkey, and CIS—were supposed to participate in the finals. Riot hasn’t revealed if it will be changing this seeding with the cancellation of the CIS qualifiers.
