Qatar has done almost nothing to end labor abuse: Amnesty

The picture taken on November 16, 2014 shows workers at a construction site in the Qatari capital, Doha.

Amnesty International has criticized Qatar for its failure to carry out labor reforms related to migrant workers ahead of the 2022 football World Cup.

“Despite massive public exposure of the appalling conditions faced by most migrant construction workers, the Qatari authorities have done almost nothing effective to end chronic labor exploitation,” Amnesty said in a statement on Tuesday.

The rights group said that a lack of substantive change “shames” the Persian Gulf state and FIFA, football's governing body.

Amnesty’s statement coincided with FIFA’s controversial decision on December 2, 2010, which allows Qatar to host world sport's biggest tournament.

The rights group called on FIFA officials and the World Cup's major sponsors to press for reforms before it is too late.

“Too little has been done to address rampant migrant labor abuse. Qatar’s persistent labor reform delays are a recipe for human rights disaster,” said Mustafa Qadri, a Persian Gulf migrant rights researcher at Amnesty International.

The rights group said Qatar had failed to make changes in several key areas, including giving workers the freedom to change jobs, to leave the country and the right to join unions.

“The reforms proposed by the government fail to tackle the central issues that leave so many workers at the mercy of employers, yet even these changes have been delayed” Qadri said.

Human rights organizations have repeatedly accused Qatar of dragging its feet on its labor law reforms, insisting that not enough is being done to investigate the effect of working long hours in temperatures that often exceed 50 degrees centigrade.

There are around 1.8 million foreign workers in Qatar, many working on major infrastructure projects directly or indirectly related to the World Cup.

Despite the kingdom’s promises to improve their working conditions, Nepalese migrants died at a rate of one every two days in 2014.


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