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The World Cup 2022 Supreme Committee is doing “everything they can” to make working conditions safe for migrant labourers in the country, a top official of the organising committee has said. |
On the criticism of Qatar’s treatment of expatriate workers by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, Communications Director of the World Cup 2022 Supreme Committee, Nasser al-Khater, said the committee was doing “everything they can to make working conditions safe” in Qatar as preparations are under way.
In an interview to Al Jazeera’s Lee Wellings in Brazil, al-Khater said:
“I think people have to keep in mind Qatar, and the progress of Qatar, and the evolution of Qatar in the past 30 years, what Qatar has achieved, is what some western European countries have achieved in 150 years that includes laws as well. Labour laws are mashed within these laws, what happens in a country that progresses so quickly and population-wise progresses so quickly. I have to tell Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, we work with them, I find them fantastic, they are very collaborative, they are very constructive, they are critical when they have to be and we like working with them.”
Al-Khater reassured the world the 2022 World Cup will be a celebration and truly a Middle Eastern affair.
“These two billion people are going to be from various cultures, various ethnicities, various people from different parts of West Asia, the Middle East, north Africa and I think it is going to be rich and vibrant. That will be the time when people are going to realise that they are mingling with people in the Middle East, celebrating the common language of football, which is going to be absolutely great.
“The Middle East had three attempts prior to ours, and this is just a continuation for us of trying an attempt to host the first World Cup in the Middle East and we’ve succeeded and therefore we stay committed to what we’ve said, that we want truly for this to be a World Cup that represents the Middle East, that people experience a Middle Eastern culture, not just the Qatari culture.”
The interview will be on Al Jazeera English today at 1045GMT (1.45pm Qatar time).
