The Qatar Olympic Committee confirmed on Wednesday that it is pursuing a bid to host the 2036 Summer Olympics and Paralympics, citing its recently completed sports stadiums and other facilities built for the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al Thani, president of the Qatar Olympic Committee, praised his country’s “tremendous growth” in anticipation of the 2022 FIFA World Cup, which allegedly makes the Islamist country an ideal host to promote “the values of inclusivity, sustainability and international collaboration.”
No Middle Eastern country has hosted an Olympic event in the modern era of the Games, and Gulf states emerging as premier sports hosting venues is a nascent phenomenon. Qatar itself broke the mold by hosting the 2022 World Cup, preceding FIFA’s choice to grant hosting responsibilities in 2036 to neighboring Saudi Arabia.
Ceding control of the largest sporting event in the world to an Islamist nation would likely present human rights concerns given the country’s ban on consuming alcohol, its abuses against LGBT people, and strict legal definitions of “public order and morality.” The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has mostly disregarded human rights concerns in the past, however, notoriously granting Winter Olympics hosting duties in 2022 to a nation actively engaging in genocide at the time (and currently), China.
Sheikh Joaan, in comments this week, celebrated the “monumental success” of the 2022 World Cup as a testament to Qatar’s competence in hosting the Olympics. The nation, he claimed, has “95 per cent of the required sports infrastructure in place to host the Games,” according to the Emirati newspaper The National, and “a comprehensive national plan to ensure 100 per cent readiness of all facilities.”
“Our journey to 2022 was one of tremendous growth. The path toward 2036 will build on that foundation with a new kind of legacy,” he continued, “an achievement that crowns Qatar’s efforts to develop skills and create economic opportunities for all its people.”
Fans are cheering during a charity football match, The Stand with Palestine, at the Education City Stadium in Doha, Qatar, on December 15, 2023. (Noushad Thekkayil/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
“This plan is rooted in a long-term vision aimed at building a socially, economically and environmentally sustainable legacy,” the official concluded. “Our objective goes beyond simply organising a successful event, we aim to deliver a global experience that reinforces the values of inclusivity, sustainability and international collaboration.”
The Qatar Olympic Committee itself said in a separate statement that it was now in “ongoing discussions” with the IOC, Qatari news network Al Jazeera reported. It did not detail what step in that process Doha was currently in.
Qatar has engaged in two prior unsuccessful bids to host the Olympics, in 2016 and 2020. The next two rounds of Summer Olympics are scheduled to take place in Los Angeles, California, in 2028, and Brisbane, Australia, in 2032. To host in 2036, Qatar would have to defeat bids from at least four other countries: Indonesia, Chile, Turkey, and India. None of the countries bidding have ever hosted a round of Olympic Games, meaning the 2036 Games will have a new host debut that year unless a veteran host state enters a bid before the IOC’s deadline. The National listed Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Egypt, Italy, Germany, Denmark and Canada as countries reportedly considering competing for 2036.
Human rights experts have deemed the years leading up to Qatar’s World Cup hosting duties as a disaster, fraught with extreme labor abuses and, according to the Qatari government itself, hundreds of deaths. In November 2022, as the tournament began, Human Rights Watch published a 42-page report detailing the extreme labor abuses, violations of women and LGBT rights, and repression of free speech in the country in anticipation of the event.
“Since FIFA awarded the 2022 World Cup to Qatar despite its poor human rights records and massive infrastructure debt, there have been thousands of unexplained migrant worker deaths,” Human Rights Watch detailed, “and many more migrant workers have been charged high illegal recruitment fees to secure employment in Qatar and subject to wage theft.”
FIFA President Gianni Infantino responded to widespread criticism of Qatar’s human rights record with a monologue in which he adopted a variety of international identities.
“Today, I feel Qatari. Today I feel Arab. Today I feel African. Today I feel gay,” he told reporters. “Today I feel disabled. Today I feel (like) a vagrant. Today I feel (like) a migrant worker.”
Many of the abuses made against migrant workers were done under a system known as kefala, which Doha eliminated prior to the tournament. Under the system, corporations and contractors could import migrant workers, paying for their travel and lodgings, but essentially owned those workers as a result, denying them of basic human rights. This led to documented episodes of overwork in the hot desert climate and other abuses. A top Qatari official, head of the Qatari Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy Hassan al-Thawadi, admitted in late November 2022 that “between 400 and 500” people died building World Cup facilities. Human rights groups assert the true number is much higher. Prior to al-Thawadi’s comments, the Qatari government had admitted to 40 deaths tied to World Cup facilities, but most were documented as a result of unrelated illness, rather than hazardous work environments or overwork.
The Qatari government responded fiercely to global human rights criticism, accusing the concerned of racism.
“Since we won the honor of hosting the World Cup, Qatar has been subjected to an unprecedented campaign that no host country has ever faced,” Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, the emir of Qatar, denounced in October of that year.
Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani plainly called human rights concerns “arrogant” and “racist.”
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