The organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) urged the FIFA and the Qatari authorities to compensate migrant workers who suffered “serious harm, including deaths, injuries and wage theft” during their participation in the construction of facilities for the 2022 World Cup.
In a statement, HRW recalled that when FIFA announced in 2010 that the Arab country would host the 2022 World Cup, it “did not impose conditions requiring Qatar to improve labor protections despite having a history of human rights abuses.” “.
worker abuse
He also pointed out that various organizations have documented “repeatedly serious abuses” against migrant workers in recent years.
After numerous criticisms of the working conditions of migrants, Qatar created compensation systems for affected workers, but the NGO pointed out that this only served to “mitigate these problems” and that these mechanisms “do not cover all employees” nor do they have taking into account those affected before 2018, when the measures were implemented.
“Almost 100 days before the tournament, it is essential that FIFA and the Qatari authorities publicly commit to compensating the workers and their families who suffered serious harm while making the World Cup possible,” said HRW’s deputy Middle East director. , Michael Page, in statements in the note.
For the organization, the benefits of existing compensation programs have been “limited due to their late introduction, limited scope or faulty implementation”.
More complaints to Qatar
It also denounced that the Qatari authorities did not investigate the causes of the death of “thousands of migrant workers”, and the organization attributes the deaths to “natural causes”.
For this reason, HRW insisted that “Qatar is obliged under international human rights law to prevent widespread violations of human rights and guarantee redress for all abuses in its territory.”
Regarding the non-payment to workers, a source from the Qatari government told Efe that in 2018 a fund was established to disburse payments to employees when a company is declared insolvent and, until the end of 2021, about 160 million euros were paid. to more than 36,000 workers.
He also pointed out that in Qatar companies are “legally obliged to compensate the families of all workers who die in a work-related incident”, after the relevant investigations are carried out. Subsequently, if it is identified that the death is work-related, an amount of compensation is determined to be paid by the company to the employee’s family, and this decision is “immediately enforceable,” the source assured.
EFE
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