Qatari authorities have recently arrested at least 60 foreign workers for protesting months of unpaid work and fired some of them just three months before hosting Doha in 2022, the research group Equidim revealed. are world Cup.”
The World Cup is set to begin in Qatar next November, and the campaign of arrests and deportations comes as Qatar faces intense international scrutiny over its treatment of workers ahead of the tournament.
According to this agency, Qatar, like other countries in the Persian Gulf, relies heavily on foreign workers, and the workers’ protest a week ago and Qatar’s reaction to it may increase concerns about Doha’s treatment of “workers”.
“These arrests raise new doubts about Qatar’s commitment to improving its approach to workers,” said Mustafa Qadri, head of Equidem, which is investigating the incident.
On Sunday evening, the Qatari government acknowledged in a statement to The Associated Press that it had arrested a number of protesters for “violating public safety laws.”
The government declined to provide any information on arrests or deportations.
On August 14, videos posted online showed about 60 workers protesting outside the headquarters of Al-Bandari International Group, a conglomerate that includes construction companies, real estate, hotels, restaurants and other projects.
In these videos, the demonstrators blocked an intersection on the Third Ring Road in Doha, in front of the Al Shumukh Towers.
The footage matches the well-known details of the street, including the presence of several large photographs of Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, looking out at passers-by. Request for comment
“Some of the protesters have not received salaries for up to seven months,” said Ekwedem.
The Qatari government acknowledged that “the company has not paid salaries and the Ministry of Labor will pay all outstanding salaries to those affected.”
The government said it was “already investigating the company’s non-payment of wages prior to the incident and will take further action after the deadline for the settlement of arrears.”
Qadri stated that “police later arrested the protesters and detained them in a detention center where some said they were exposed to suffocating heat without air conditioning.”
And the temperature in Doha this week reached about 41 degrees Celsius.
Arrested workers complained of overcrowding, where 25 to 30 people were crammed into a room, and officials turned off the air conditioning, quipping that if they could protest in the heat, they could do without air conditioning in the detention center. endure According to the relevant organization “Migrant Rights”, the rights of migrant workers.
“More than 300 colleagues from Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Nepal and the Philippines are there,” said a detained worker who called the organization from the detention center. ”
According to the Associated Press, Qatar, like other Arab countries along the Persian Gulf, has already expelled protesting foreign workers and linked residency visas to work.
According to the Washington-based Freedom House group, the right to form unions is tightly controlled and only available to Qataris, as are restrictions on the right to assemble.
Qatar, a small energy-rich country on the Arabian Peninsula, is home to the state-funded Al Jazeera news network, yet expression in the country is tightly controlled.
Since FIFA awarded the tournament to Qatar in 2010, the country has taken steps to reform recruitment practices.
According to the Associated Press, that includes eliminating the so-called sponsorship system that ties workers to their employers, who have a say in whether they leave or even send them abroad.
Qatar has set a monthly minimum wage of 1,000 Qatari riyals, equivalent to $275, for workers, and food and housing allowances for employees not directly paid by their employers.
For their part, activists like Qadri called on Doha to “do more, especially in ensuring that workers receive their rights on time and protect them from abusive employers.”
Asked if Qatar had been fooling us all for the past few years, Al-Qadri noted that recent reforms may have been a ‘cover’ for the authorities to allow current business practices to continue.
Source: Lebanon Debate
