Qatar World Cup migrant workers to receive compensation
Qatar World Cup organisers say migrant workers building stadiums will receive more than $5 million in compensation after recruitment fees were demanded to secure employment in the Gulf nation.
The announcement highlights ongoing concerns about the exploitation of workers, many of them drawn from South Asian nations including India and Nepal, who are relied on to prepare Qatar for the FIFA tournament in 2022.
Qatar World Cup Organising Committee Secretary General Hassan Al Thawadi today acknowledged that "all too often, the very people who have left their homes to provide for their families are the ones exploited."
Al Thawadi says his organizsng committee and contractors "have agreed on a mechanism to ensure that our workers are reimbursed for the hardships they may have endured when coming to Qatar to work."
A report released last month revealed that migrant workers on Qatar's 2022 World Cup building sites were going up to five months without a break.
Reviving concerns about labour conditions, the audit by Impactt, the World Cup organisers' external compliance monitor, found working hours exceeded 72 hours per week at eight construction companies, described as a "critical" non-compliance of expected practices.
The report found 96% of new workers were paid an average of $1,248, with the majority not receiving a receipt, according to interviews with a sample of 24.
Impactt did, though, acknowledge a "new spirit" in Qatar to embrace changes to labor laws, including holding elections for worker welfare forums.
In 2012, the Qatari Government revealed 520 people from Bangladesh, India and Nepal - whose citizens travel in their hundreds of thousands to do construction work in the Gulf - had died of World Cup related construction products.
Image: Qatar World Cup Organising Committee Secretary General Hassan Al Thawadi.
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