Britain's Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg joined calls on Sunday for Russia to be stripped of the World Cup in 2018 following the downing of flight MH17 over Ukraine.

The Liberal Democrat leader, whose party is the junior partner in Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron's coalition government, said sporting events should be part of a new package of EU sanctions against Moscow.

"You can't have this - the beautiful game - marred by the ugly aggression of Russia on the Russian-Ukrainian border," Clegg told the Sunday Times newspaper.