All of the concern around the awarding of the 2024 World Cup to Qatar is beginning to feel warranted.
While the on-field play doesn’t begin until Sunday, many fans and reporters are already arriving in the country to begin enjoying the event which only is held every four years.
Yesterday, media censorship became a massive concern in Qatar, and especially in the country’s capital city Doha.
A Danish news station called TV2 was filming a segment on the upcoming World Cup when Qatari officials swarmed the reporter and film crew.
A video released by The I Paper shows the broadcast during and immediately after the officials begin harassing the crew.
WATCH: Private security guards in Qatar forced a Danish reporter off the air as he reported live from the World Cup ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/tUV1y8CmHI
— i newspaper (@theipaper) November 16, 2022
Rasmus Tantholdt is the man who can be seen holding a microphone, asking the officials what is happening, and demanding a reason for this incursion.
You invited the world to come here, why can’t we film? It’s a public place. You can break the camera, you want to break it? You are threatening us by smashing the camera?
In a translation of TV2’s website, the altercation was explained in clearer detail.
The team was bluntly told that if they didn’t stop filming, their cameras would be destroyed. This is despite the fact that TV2’s team has acquired the correct accreditations and reported from a public place.
Qatar’s Super Committee for Delivery and Legacy, which is the body largely in charge of the running of these games from Qatar’s end said that this was a mistake and that the film crew was doing nothing wrong.
This is far from being the only controversy surrounding this year’s World Cup.
Many fans have found themselves disappointed by the housing accommodations offered to foreign visitors.
Some fans will be staying in tents and shipping containers that have been outfitted with doors to provide enough housing for fans who came from all around the globe.
Those shipping containers are said to cost $200 per night.
While they are outfitted with beds, I can’t begin to imagine the disappointment that fans feel at being unable to book a real room for their stay.
Yet another issue surrounding this year’s host, Qatar, is the fear that slave labor was used in the creation of stadiums and infrastructure as the country hurried to completion, as Amnesty International has alleged.
Migrant workers were lured to Qatar with hopes of high wages, although many appear to have found trouble when it came time to receive their payment.
Ultimately, these allegations seem to surprise no one, as almost all soccer fans knew that these games would be filled with social injustices.
It is tough to admit, but seeing all of this turmoil in a country like Qatar is far from surprising and the FIFA governing body should have known better than to place the games in that region.
By: Goose
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