Qatar: Six months post-World Cup, migrant workers suffer
Six months after the 2022 World Cup final in Doha, FIFA and Qatari authorities have failed to provide compensation for widespread abuses, including wage theft and unexplained deaths of migrant workers who prepared and delivered the tournament, Human Rights Watch said today.
Migrant workers who have remained in Qatar have not received compensation for past abuses and face escalating wage theft and new forms of exploitation. This highlights the inadequacies of Qatar's labor reforms and the shameful human rights legacy of the 2022 FIFA World Cup...
Human Rights Watch spoke to two dozen Indian, Kenyan, and Nepali migrant workers who are either working in Qatar or have returned home in the last year, as well as managers from two labor supply companies, about labor conditions after the tournament. Interviewees said the post-World Cup Qatar labor market has experienced a significant slowdown, leading to major challenges for businesses, especially labor supply companies and construction subcontractors.
For migrant workers, this slowdown has resulted in wage theft, including unpaid salaries and denial of end-of-service benefits. In many cases, workers were asked by employers to wait idly for new work, sometimes for months, without being paid...
...Previous Human Rights Watch research has shown that companies higher up the supply chain fail to pay subcontractors, leading to insolvency and causing the most harm to workers, who end up subject to wage theft...