For the Qatar World Cup ambassador, Khalid Salmanl’homosexuality it’s a “pischico damage“. She declared it in an interview with the German television station Zdf, saying that “the most important thing”, as regards the arrival of gay people in her country, is the following: “Everyone will accept that they come to our country . But they will have to accept our rules ». The response of the German Interior Minister, Nancy Faeser, was immediate, calling Salman’s words “horrible”.
Unfortunately, however, such reactions are of little use, because, as evidenced by a report dell’Human Rights Watch and from testimony of a gay man resident in Qatar, the abuses and violence of the Qatari police against people of the LGBT community do not stop. Not even in the face of the start of the World Cup on November 20, not even after the pressure from FIFA and the international community to respect an inclusive tournament for fans and players.
The testimony of the homosexual man raped by several police officers
“I was the victim of one group rape by the Qatari security forces ”. Ali (invented name, ndr.) is a gay man of Filipino origin who worked in Qatar as an office assistant. He reported what happened to him to the British newspaper iwhich tells the story.
It all started when Ali received a message about a ‘app for gay dating by a man who claimed to be a Turkish worker. With the false promise of a sum of money it was attracted to a hotel roomwhere they were waiting for him six men who identified themselves as Qatari police. “I really wanted to jump out the window, but I couldn’t, it was too tall and they had already cornered me inside the room. They took me and threw me on the bed. They started raping me in turns, ”she said.
After suffering the violence, “I slept in prison for one night and when I woke up they took me to the deportation center. There I waited two days to receive my passport and ticket to return to the Philippines. They have deleted all my documents, ”concluded Ali.
The Human Rights Watch report
«As Qatar prepares to host the World Cup, the security forces arrest and mistreat people from the LGBT community simply for what they are, apparently confident that abuses by the security forces will not be reported or controlled, ”said Rasha Younes, a researcher on LGBT rights at the organization that monitors respect for human rights around the world.
The New York-based group said it documented “six cases from severe beatings and repeated e five cases from sexual harassment»By the Qatari authorities between 2019 and 2022. Human Rights Watch then stated that it had spoken to four transgender women, a bisexual woman and a gay man, all held in an underground prison in Doha. “Without charges, in one case for two months in solitary confinement, without access to a lawyer,” the report reads. “No one has received any records of being detained. These acts could constitute arbitrary detention under international human rights law».
People interviewed said they were slapped, kicked and punched while in detention. At least one woman said she had lost consciousness, while one of the transgender women said she was arrested on the street in Doha, accused of “imitate women“. Once inside a police vehicle, authorities beat her, bleeding her lips and nose and kicking her in the stomach. According to the report, one of her authorities told her: “You gays are immoral, so we will be the same as you“. “I was detained for three weeks without charge and the officers repeatedly sexually harassed me,” the woman said, adding that part of the requirement for release was participation in sessions with a psychologist who “it would make me a man again».
Human Rights Watch said the arbitrary arrests of the people interviewed appeared to be based on one law permitting provisional detention if “there are good reasons to believe that the accused may have committed a crime”, including “violation of public morality”.