Blatter backs calls from EU on Qatar workers

ROME: FIFA President Sepp Blatter backed calls from the European Union Parliament urging Qatar to stop contractors from abusing migrant workers involved in building facilities for the 2022 World Cup.
“We deplore what happened there,” Blatter said in Rome following an audience with Pope Francis on Friday.
The EU parliament insisted on Thursday the alleged abuses should be fully investigated.
Qatari organizers pledged this week that companies building World Cup projects will be forced to guarantee welfare standards for workers.
Rights group Amnesty International has cataloged how some workers in the tiny Gulf nation are exposed to dangerous working conditions, poor living standards and the non-payment of wages.
Blatter also took aim at the companies working on the venues.
“The big companies working there, they are all European,” Blatter said. “The constructor is also responsible for his workers.” The International Trade Union Confederation set off the growing furor two months ago when it claimed that, without changes, at least 4,000 workers would die due to inhumane labor conditions.
Blatter implied the construction companies’ interests played a role in the controversial vote to award the tournament to Qatar.
“It was political pressure from European countries to bring this World Cup to Qatar, because there was so many economic interests,” he said. “Two of these countries that made pressure on the voting men in FIFA were France and Germany. This is established. This is not new information.
“It’s easy to say all the responsibility lies on FIFA. No, we are part of this responsibility. We are now monitoring the situation and we will come back to it.” Blatter reiterated his desire to hold the ‘22 tournament at the end of the year, having rejected the traditional June-July World Cup period because of Qatar’s searing desert heat.
“We are now consulting the stakeholders — teams, players, leagues, federations — about the international calendar, also media and marketing, to look if it’s possible to play at the end of the year, in November-December,” Blatter said. “I think it’s advisable to play at the end of the year.” As for next year’s World Cup in Brazil, Blatter said there was still a possibility that midday kickoff times at tropical venues could be moved later to avoid intense heat and humidity there.
Blatter said he would bring up the kickoff time questions at next month’s FIFA executive committee meeting in Salvador, Brazil.