CNN
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“Sport should not be politicized,” French President Emmanuel Macron said on Thursday, three days before the start of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
“These questions need to be asked every time events are awarded,” Macron said.
“It should be when the hosting of the event is decided, whether it’s the World Cup or the Olympics, that you have to honestly ask the question.
“And whether the question is about climate or human rights, it doesn’t have to be asked when the event happens.
“The question must be asked each time the reception is decided,” insisted the French president, speaking to journalists at a summit of the Asia-Pacific economic cooperation forum in Bangkok.
Macron, who visited Russia in 2018 to see Blues lift their second World Cup title, also reflected on his country hosting the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
“The vocation of these major events is to allow sportsmen and women from all countries, sometimes including countries at war, to allow sport to exist and sometimes to find, through sport, ways of discussing when people are not can talk to each other more,” he said.
Since the World Cup was awarded to Qatar more than a decade ago, the event has been plagued with controversy with the host country heavily criticized over alleged human rights abuses in the state. of the Gulf, the treatment of migrant workers and the apparent environmental cost of the event.
Controversy surrounding the treatment of the LGBT community also made headlines as the tournament approached.
Former FIFA President Sepp Blatter, who led the organization when Qatar won the hosting rights, recently told Swiss newspaper Tages Anzeiger that “Qatar is a mistake”, adding that “the choice was Wrong”.
Meanwhile, the Danish men’s soccer team has been banned from wearing training shirts that read ‘Human rights for all’, the CEO of the Danish Football Federation revealed last week. (DBU), Jakob Jensen.
France captain and Tottenham Hotspur player Hugo Lloris said earlier this week that he would not join other European captains in wearing a rainbow-coloured anti-discrimination armband during the tournament, claiming that “respect must be shown” to the host country, Qatar, where homosexuality is criminalized. .
A Human Rights Watch (HRW) report released in October documented alleged cases of beatings and sexual harassment.
According to victims interviewed by Human Rights Watch, security forces allegedly forced transgender women to attend conversion therapy sessions at a government-sponsored behavioral health center.
“Qatari authorities must end impunity for violence against LGBT people. The world is watching,” said Rasha Younes of Human Rights Watch.
A Qatari official told CNN that HRW’s allegations “contain information that is categorically and unequivocally false.”
Human Rights Watch also recently highlighted “arbitrary arrests and mistreatment” of LGBTQ people in Qatar.
“There are only a few days left until the World Cup kicks off, but it’s plenty of time for the Qatari government to end the mistreatment of LGBT people,” HRW said in a press release. of November.
