FIFA president Gianni Infantino has delivered a one-hour tirade on the eve of the World Cup’s opening match and then spent about 45 minutes answering questions from media.
Infantino defended the country’s immigration policy, and praised the government for bringing in migrants to work.
Qatar is governed by a hereditary emir who has absolute say over all governmental decisions and follows an ultraconservative form of Islam known as Wahhabism. In recent years, Qatar has been transformed following a natural gas boom in the 1990s, but it has faced pressure from within to stay true to its Islamic heritage and Bedouin roots.
“What we Europeans have been doing for the past 3,000 years we should be apologizing for the next 3,000 years before we start giving moral lessons to people,” said Infantino, who moved last year from Switzerland to live in Doha ahead of the World Cup. Since then, government ministers and senior World Cup organizing staff have dismissed some European criticism as racism, and calls to create a compensation fund for the families of migrant workers as a publicity stunt.Qatar has often been criticized for laws that criminalize homosexuality, limit some freedoms for women and do not offer citizenship to migrants.
FIFA also wants to create a legacy fund from its revenues tied to this year’s World Cup — and will let its critics, or anyone who wants, to contribute.
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