Key Points
- Qatari police are facing fresh allegations of abusing LGBTIQ+ people in custody.
- It comes just weeks before Qatar's hosting of this year's FIFA World Cup.
Qatari police are facing fresh allegations of abusing LGBTIQ+ people in custody just weeks before it hosts this year's FIFA World Cup.
contains the distressing accounts of six LGBTIQ+ community members, who allege they were arrested, bashed, and kept in solitary confinement due to their sexuality or expressed gender.
HRW said it has documented six cases of "severe and repeated beatings" and five cases of "sexual harassment" in police custody since 2019, with some incidents said to have occurred as recently as September this year.
Homosexuality is illegal in the conservative Muslim country, and some football stars have raised concerns over the rights of fans travelling for the event, especially LGBTIQ+ individuals and women, whom rights groups say Qatari laws discriminate against.
What did the report find?
The interviewees said security forces arrested people in public places based "solely on their gender expression" and unlawfully searched their phones.
Some said they were forced to agree to so-called conversion therapy in order to be released.
Rasha Younes, a researcher with HRW's LGBT Rights Program in the Middle East and North Africa, told SBS News interviewees said Qatari security forces arbitrarily detained them in underground prisons.
"LGBT people told Human Rights Watch that security forces detained them in an underground prison in Al Dafneh, Doha, where they verbally harassed and subjected detainees to physical abuse, ranging from slapping to kicking and punching until they bled," she said.
"Security officers also inflicted verbal abuse, extracted forced confessions, and denied detainees access to legal counsel, family, and medical care."
One interviewee, a Qatari transgender woman who was arrested by Preventive Security Department forces in public in the country's capital Doha, said she was kept in solitary confinement for two months
She described the department as being like "mafia".
"They detained me twice, once for two months in a solitary cell underground, and once for six weeks.
"They beat me every day, shaved my hair and made me take off my shirt and took a picture of my breasts.
"I suffered from depression because of my detention and I still have nightmares to this day—I’m terrified of being in public.”
Ms Younes said security forces in Qatar must end arbitrary detention of LGBTIQ+ people, and the government must repeal article 285, which condemns sexual activity from people of the same sex.
"Freedom of expression and nondiscrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity should be guaranteed, permanently, for all residents of Qatar, not just spectators going to Qatar for the World Cup," Ms Younes said.
How has the government responded to the report
A Qatari official said in a statement that HRW's allegations "contain information that is categorically and unequivocally false," without specifying.
The official also said Qatar does not "license or operate 'conversion centres'."
Organisers of the World Cup, which starts on 20 November and is the first held in a Middle Eastern nation, said that everyone, no matter their sexual orientation or background, is welcome, while also warning against public displays of affection.
England captain Harry Kane wearing the UEFA One Love armband during a match in September. Kane says he will wear the armband during the Qatar World Cup even in FIFA prohibits it. Credit: Nick Potts/PA/Alamy
“As the most multicultural, diverse and inclusive sport in Australia, we believe everyone should be able to feel safe and be their true authentic selves," a spokesperson for Football Australia said.
"Whilst we acknowledge the highest levels of assurances given by HH Amir of Qatar and the President of FIFA, that LGBTQI+ fans will be safely welcomed in Qatar, we hope that this openness can continue beyond the FIFA World Cup.”
Human rights advocacy groups, including Amnesty International, have also scrutinised Qatar's treatment of migrant workers.
One researcher has from the Doha weather station to Nepali migrant worker death tolls in Qatar, substantiating claims that some migrant worker deaths were caused by working in extreme heat for extended hours.
SBS News has contacted the Qatari embassy in Canberra for comment.
- With Reuters.
