EXCLUSIVE: Amnesty International SLAM the FA by declaring they are ‘completely lacking in courage’ over human rights abuses in Qatar ahead of the World Cup… after Sportsmail’s investigation into deaths of young Nepalese workers
- Amnesty International said the FA were ‘running down time’ on calling out the plight of workers in Qatar
- The FA indicated in December England would be briefed on the situation by external speakers
- But an executive from human rights group said those meetings never happened
- It comes after a Sportsmail investigation into the scandal of young Nepalese workers who have died while working to prepare Qatar for the World Cup
- Click here for all the latest World Cup 2022 news and updates
The FA is ‘completely lacking in courage’ to speak out against human rights abuses in Qatar and has not set up the briefings for England players which it promised, Amnesty International declared on Tuesday night.
After a Sportsmail investigation into the scandal of young Nepalese workers who have died while working to prepare Qatar for the World Cup, the human rights group said the governing body was ‘running down time’ on calling out the plight of workers and didn’t want to ‘rock the boat.’
The FA, which indicated in December that Gareth Southgate’s players would be briefed on Qatar by external speakers including Amnesty, claimed that the players had been briefed by Amnesty.
But the organisation responded to say that FA was playing with ‘semantics.’ They said their understanding is that a briefing of Southgate’s players took placing merely using Amnesty documents.
‘We have never been to Wembley or anywhere else to provide a briefing to players. They only have to say the word and we will be there next week’ said a senior Amnesty official.
Peter Frankental, Amnesty International UK’s Economic Affairs Programme Director, told Sportsmail: ‘A number of half promises have been made through the media about human rights groups briefing players. But no request has been made to us or any other organisation.’
The FA are ‘completely lacking in courage’ to speak out against human rights abuses, Amnesty International say
The FA indicated that England’s players would be briefed about the situation in December
Several meetings between Amnesty and the FA have taken place and there has been contact with the organisation’s research team.
But Mr Frankental said: ‘Those meetings have not been particularly constructive. It’s not that individuals from the FA are not interested but we feel the FA, as a matter of policy, are reluctant to call out these violations.
‘It’s a softly, softly approach, to avoid sending the wrong message to FIFA, Qatar and the other key players. But 12 years after the World Cup was awarded, we would expect them to be much more engaged in human rights abuses and taking a stance, like we have found the Netherlands, Norway and Denmark FAs have done. They seem to be completely lacking in courage when it comes to taking any steps.’
Sportsmail‘s investigation established that 239 Nepalese workers died in Qatar in a 12-month period from 2020 to 2021 alone – and that is just the number whose families have applied for compensation.
But the human rights group claim a briefing of Gareth Southgate’s players took placing merely using Amnesty documents
Those aged 25 to 35 form the largest category. We discovered meaningless death certificates issued for young World Cup stadium workers, without post mortems to establish why their health had actually deteriorated so catastrophically.
Amnesty welcomed out investigation and said football could make a huge difference by wielding its influence now.
But the FA signed a ‘memorandum of understanding’ with Qatar in 2018 and its chief executive Mark Bullingham claimed last year that migrant workers in the World Cup host nation were ‘fully behind’ the World Cup. That astonished human rights groups.
By contrast, Denmark’s sponsors will undertake no commercial activity in Qatar during the World Cup and not have their names on the team’s training jersey. The Danish players will wear human rights messages when they train at the tournament.
It comes after a Sportsmail investigation into the scandal of Nepalese workers like Rup Chandra Rumba (R) who have died
Liverpool FC elicited details about the death of one of the victims we featured, Rup Chandra Rumba, when they demanded answers from the Qatar World Cup Supreme Committee, before playing in Doha’s 2019 Club World Cup. It proved how football can make a difference.
Sportsmail put the findings of our investigation to FIFA. We asked if the governing body would take the phoney death certificate issue up with Qatar and its Supreme Committee, on the basis of what we have written.
FIFA said in a statement that it was ‘implementing an unprecedented due diligence process in relation to the protection of workers involved in the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.’
Denmark’s sponsors will undertake no commercial activity in Qatar during the World Cup
There are many other cases, beyond those Sportsmail highlighted. Sujan Lopchan’s family was initially told informally that the 30-year-old insulation worker had died because of alcohol intake – when his death certificate stated ‘acute respiratory failure for further investigation. ‘He used to drink but not that much,’ said his bewildered brother Ganesh. ‘We have received no compensation for his life except his outstanding salary and allowances.’
Amnesty and other human rights groups have written collectively to the FA this week, asking them to support the idea of a £350million FIFA compensation fund for workers and a migrant workers’ organisation.
The FA said last night that it was ‘in dialogue with human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and felt ‘from those discussions that there is evidence of substantial progress being made by Qatar in relation to workers’ rights.’ It recognised ‘there is still more to be done.’
Mark Bullingham claimed migrant workers in the host nation were ‘fully behind’ the World Cup
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