ILO Complaint against Qatar for Non-Compliance, Forced Labor Conventions
2022 World Cup Qatar: The Story Behind the Deaths
In 2014, the International Labor Organization filed a formal complaint alleging non-compliance, against Qatar, with the 1940 Forced Labour Convention and the 1947 Inspection Convention. At the heart of the complaint was the Kafala system, which made it virtually impossible for a worker to leave an abusive employer. The ILO gave Qatar one year to reform the Kafala system, before the complaint was escalated to a Commission of Inquiry, the highest level of sanction for this UN agency.
What is the ILO?
The International Labor Association was created by the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I. Its creation was based on the idea that lasting peace would require social justice. In 1946, The ILO became an agency within the UN. Qatar has been a member of the ILO since 1972, and they ratified the Forced Labor Convention in 1988
Sportswashing
The 2022 World Cup is largely a “sportswashing” event. It’s designed to enhance Qatar’s political standing, while covering over the Gulf State’s awful human rights record, terrorist ties, and their role in destabilizing the region. Because of these factors, sanctions by a UN agency had to be taken seriously.
Complaint Closed
However, The ILO closed the complaint in 2017, citing new laws protecting workers in Qatar, along with promises to reform. In 2016, Qatar passed a new law regulating entry into and exit from the country, which the government claimed abolished the Kafala system. Amnesty , along with other rights organizations, warned that the law did not go far enough and that it left the 2.1 million workers already in Qatar, unprotected. Furthermore, the new law was not followed, and Qatar continued to block migrant workers from leaving the country to return home.
New Boss Same as the Old Boss
Follow-ups by Amnesty International in 2018 and 2019 revealed little change, including the rate of migrant deaths. Furthermore, at a time when an adequate health system can establish a specific cause of all but 1 percent of deaths, 70 percent of deaths among migrant workers in Qatar went unexplained. However, as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and anti-slavery organizations make clear, the cause is actually understood quite well: deadly levels of exploitation and abuse. In simpler terms, migrants were worked to death in the blistering heat.
The main fact is this: the richest country in the world recruits laborers from some of the poorest countries in the world, and the exploitation, abuse, and deaths all proceed from that main fact.
