Qatar will keep 2022 World Cup despite human rights concerns - FIFA official
Qatar will not be stripped of the 2022 World Cup despite concerns over its treatment of migrant workers, a senior member of FIFA’s executive committee said on Thursday. <br /><br />“The decision is to grant the World Cup to Qatar. Whether I like it or not, that doesn’t play a role. It’s been decided. There are contracts and now we are working together with others, under the concept of joint responsibility to improve conditions,” said Theo Zwanziger, a former chairman of the German Football Federation. <br /><br />Zwanziger was appearing at a European Parliament hearing on the emirate’s treatment of migrant workers working on World Cup-related construction projects. The issue has been in the spotlight even since Qatar was awarded the tournament.<br /><br />“The decision to grant the World Cup to Qatar happened in a context where human rights was not given a very high profile,” he told lawmakers.<br /><br />“We are going to have to give this issue a much higher status in the future.”<br /><br />An investigation by Britain’s Guardian newspaper uncovered evidence of poor working conditions, squalid accommodation and unpaid wages. <br /><br />Qatar’s kafala system has also been criticised by human rights organisations. Under kafala rules, a foreign worker’s residency permit is tied to their job. An employee cannot leave the country with his employer’s approval.<br /><br />When asked by euronews if FIFA would push Qatar to abolish the system, Zwanziger said: “What do you expect from a football organisation? Two years after we made the decision we noticed (all this). I mean do you expect us to interfere in matters of state?” the 68-year-old lawyer told reporters in Brussels.<br /><br />The FIFA executive’s appearance before MEPs came two days after Qatar published a ‘workers’ charter’ on the rights of employees, described as a “sham” by unions as it is not enforceable in a court of law.<br /><br />Sharan Burrow, the secretary-general of the International Trade Union Confederation, said she was sceptical over whether the Qataris would change their legislation.<br /><br />“Frankly, both the Qatari statement today and the workers’ charter are sham provisions. They are window dressing. We have seen it before. And it just seems like this is a country that wants to treat workers as less than human.”<br /><br />The ITUC wants workers to be given proper legal representation; the right to form trade unions, and for the kafala system to be abolished.<br /><br />At least 185 Nepalese worker died in Qatar in 2013 alone, according to official figures. The numbers for migrant workers from elsewhere have not yet been published. <br /><br />Footballer Zahir Belounis was trapped in Qatar for two years amid a pay dispute with his club, which refused to sign his exit visa.<br /><br />“When you want to leave the country, you have to ask your employer’s permission. Without their signature, you can’t leave the country,” he told euronews.<br /><br />“There was a time that I wanted to be dead it was so horrible. They treated me as if I was the guilty one.”<br /><br />Belounis has since retired from football, but he says he hopes his case will help bring the plight of other workers in Qatar to the world’s attention.<br /><br />Euronews asked the Qatari ambassador to Belgium for an interview. The request went unanswered.
