Guardian: 185 Nepalese died in Qatar last year
Following its ongoing coverage of Qatar and the 2022 Fifa World Cup, the Guardian newspaper published the following story on Saturday:
The extent of the risks faced by migrant construction workers building the infrastructure for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar has been laid bare by official documents revealing that 185 Nepalese men died last year alone.
The 2013 death toll, which is expected to rise as new cases come to light, is likely to spark fresh concern over the treatment of migrant workers in Qatar and increase the pressure on Fifa to force meaningful change.
According to the documents the total number of verified deaths among workers from Nepal – just one of several countries that supply hundreds of thousands of migrant workers to the gas-rich state – is now at least 382 in two years alone.
At least 36 of those deaths were registered in the weeks following the global outcry after the Guardian's original revelations in September.
The revelations forced Fifa's president, Sepp Blatter, to promise that football would not turn a blind eye to the issue following a stormy executive committee meeting.
Qatar's ministry of labour hired law firm DLA Piper to conduct an urgent review and Hassan al-Thawadi, chief executive of the World Cup organising committee, said the findings would be treated with the utmost seriousness, vowing that the tournament would not be built "on the blood of innocents".
The DLA Piper report is expected to be published in the coming weeks.
The Nepalese make up about a sixth of Qatar's 2 million-strong population of migrant workers.
Verified figures for the 2013 death rates among those from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and elsewhere have yet to emerge.
The Nepalese organisation working with the families of dead workers to repatriate their bodies and campaign for adequate compensation from the companies that employed them under the kafala sponsorship system said on Friday that Fifa should do more.
Read more on The Guardian here. | Photo by Sam Agnew in the QL Flickr group
Oh well..sad to think that asian labourers were treated like nothing else they are the less fortunate individual in qatar being paid less and work very hard. No choice for them but to grab the little opportunity in order to feed their family back home.
To sTrangR : Well said about Egyptians
Qatar Govt. has no control over these companies , especially Qatari owned companies . Most Qataries do not case about labor rules , labor rights .
Unfortunately it works this way .
I guess you forget about Egyptians . They kill each other in their country and pray 5 times for forgiveness , matter solved , nice idea ha? . I found them least compassionate among two legged animals .
if a labour has a boss Arabian for example Syrian ,palestian .or Lebanon they just treat Asian as slave but they forget they to are slave of Qatari people
They don't care if they die. When they die, they will just hire new people, easy. And they will not take necessary step to change what's the cause of death. People are so replaceable nowadays, money has so much value compared to human brains. Welcome to 21st Century!
Tragic reflection. The leaders need to step up and take action against the companies and compensate the familes for starters.