Qatar, dictatorship and US ally

This video says about itself:

Qatar is a transit and destination country for men and women trafficked for the purposes of involuntary servitude and commercial sexual exploitation. Men and women from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Ethiopia, Sudan, Thailand, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and China voluntarily travel to Qatar as laborers and domestic servants, but subsequently face conditions indicative of involuntary servitude.

These conditions include threats of serious harm, including financial harm; job switching; withholding of pay; charging workers for benefits for which the employer is responsible; restrictions on freedom of movement, including the confiscation of passports and travel documents and the withholding of exit permits; arbitrary detention; threats of legal action and deportation; false charges; and physical, mental and sexual abuse.

Homosexuality is forbidden all together, you can be thrown into jail or worse if you are gay or lesbian, animal rights also don’t matter. This is the host nation chosen by FIFA through vote rigging and bribery for the 2022 Football World Cup. Boycott Qatar 2022 and all its sponsors including Coca Cola, Sony, Hyundai, Kia, McDonalds, Emirates etc.

At least 3000 laborers die in Qatar a year from falling off construction sites or collapsing due to heat. More information can be found on Qatar sucks by searching google and clicking on the Qatarsucks website, this website has been banned on Qatar web servers by the order of the Qatar’s King/Emir.

By Kate Randall in the USA:

US State Department human rights reports

Gulf allies: A record of repression and torture

Part 2: Qatar

22 April 2011

The US State Department recently released its “2010 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices.” This year’s annual report provides details on human rights conditions in over 190 countries. Included are reports on the member countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which represents the US-backed monarchies of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait.

This Saudi-dominated alliance backed the imposition of a no-fly zone in Libya, and has provided key support for the attack on Libya by the United States and European powers. The GCC has also provided military and police personnel to put down insurrections against the repressive regimes in Bahrain and Yemen.

While the US seeks to cloak its imperialist assault on Libya in “humanitarian” terms, its allies in the GCC are guilty of widespread violations of human rights and practice repression and torture in their own countries. This WSWS series examines these human rights abuses as documented in the State Department reports. This installment covers Qatar, which is one of only two Arab countries to back the attack on Libya, and is reportedly supplying arms to the “rebels”. For our report on Saudi Arabia, click here.

Qatar is a constitutional monarchy, headed by Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani. The emir exercises full executive power over Qatar’s population of approximately 1.7 million people.

Qatar has the world’s largest per capita production and proven reserves of both oil and natural gas, and in 2010 had the world’s highest gross domestic product per capita. The US maintains a strategic military presence in the emirate, which is home to both the US Central Command’s Forward Headquarters and the Combined Air Operations Center.

This wealth and US strategic support, however, has not translated into prosperity for the vast majority of Qataris. Foreigners and other non-citizens make up more than 85 percent of the population, and suffer discrimination and a lack of basic rights at an even higher level than Qatar’s citizens.

According to the introduction to the US State Department’s report on Qatar, the country’s people faced the following conditions in 2010:

“Citizens lacked the right to change the leadership of their government by election. There were prolonged detentions in crowded facilities, often ending with deportation. The government placed restrictions on civil liberties, including freedoms of speech, press (including the Internet), assembly, association, and religion. Foreign laborers faced restrictions on travel abroad.

“Trafficking in persons, primarily in the labor and domestic worker sectors, was a problem. Legal, institutional, and cultural discrimination against women limited their participation in society. The unresolved legal status of ‘Bidoons’ (stateless persons with residency ties) resulted in discrimination against these noncitizens. Authorities severely restricted worker rights, especially for foreign laborers and domestic servants.”

Abusive detention and judicial practices

Sharia (Islamic law) is a primary source of legislation, and the government allows corporal punishment for certain criminal offenses. Documentation of government officials practicing torture or other “ill treatment” was limited, in part due to reluctance of alleged victims to come forward to make public claims of torture or abuse.

At least 18 people, mostly foreign nationals, were reportedly sentenced to flogging for offenses related to “illicit sexual relations” or alcohol consumption. In March 2010, a Doha court sentenced a police officer to one year in prison for intentionally burning an Indian citizen with cigarettes during a 2006 interrogation. Two months later a superior court suspended the penalty, “stating that it was the first time he committed such a crime and that he was unlikely to repeat the abuse,” according to the US State Department report.

Conditions in many prisons and detention centers did not meet international standards, and there were no monitoring visits by human rights observers during the year. Prisoners’ access to family and legal counsel was limited at the state security prison. Ombudsmen cannot serve on behalf of prisoners or detainees.

Under the Protection of Society and Combating Terrorism Law, authorities can detain individuals in the state security prison for indefinite periods. While criminal law requires that persons be served arrest warrants based on sufficient evidence and be charged within 24 hours and brought to court without undue delay, this anti-terrorism law provides an exception allowing for detention as long as two years, extendable indefinitely by the prime minister.

Although suspects are legally entitled to bail, it is granted infrequently and is more likely to be granted to citizens than non-citizens. The constitution provides for an independent jury, but the emir appoints all of the judges, who serve at his discretion. Three quarters of the judges were foreign nationals whose residency depended on permits granted by civil authorities.

While there are no separate Sharia courts, civil courts’ interpretation of Islamic law denied women equal status in proceedings such as marriage, divorce and custody. In such cases a woman’s testimony was equal to half that of a man’s.

High fees restrict the right of appeal. An appellant must often deposit fees ranging from 5,000 riyals ($1,375) to 20,000 riyals ($5,500) to appeal, and these fees may be seized in whole or part if a court rejects the appeal.