UN Authority Figures

UN General Assembly Third Committee, the Social, Humanitarian
and Cultural Affairs Committee, Vice-Chair: Qatar


Qatar is building a World Cup stadium with what human rights activists are calling "modern slavery," using a migrant workforce that faces deadly conditions, miserable accommodations and low wages.
Source: Fox News, June 24, 2016

Mission of the Third Committee, the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Affairs Committee, of the General Assembly: The Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Affairs Committee deals with "a range of social, humanitarian affairs and human rights issues that affect peoples all over the world...the advancement of women, the protection of children, indigenous issues, the treatment of refugees, the promotion of fundamental freedoms through the elimination of racism and racial discrimination..." (General Assembly - Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Affairs Committee website, "Third Committee")

Term of office: 2017-2018

Qatar's Record on "human rights issues that affect peoples all over the world...the advancement of women, the protection of children, indigenous issues, the treatment of refugees, the promotion of fundamental freedoms through the elimination of racism and racial discrimination":
"The principal human rights problems were...restriction of fundamental civil liberties,... Legal, institutional, and cultural discrimination against women limited their participation in society. Trafficking in persons, primarily in the domestic worker and labor sectors, was a continuing problem. The noncitizen "bidoon" (stateless persons) who resided in the country with unresolved legal status experienced social discrimination... The government interprets sharia as allowing corporal punishment for certain criminal offenses, including...extramarital sex by Muslims... No specific law criminalizes domestic violence... rape and domestic violence against women continued to be a problem. In the past police treated domestic violence as a private family matter rather than a criminal matter and were reluctant to investigate or prosecute reports... In some cases sponsors sexually harassed and mistreated foreign domestic servants... [S]ocial and legal discrimination against women persisted... Traditions of sharia also significantly disadvantage women in family, property, and inheritance law and in the judicial system generally... Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) persons faced discrimination under the law and in practice." (US State Department's Country Report on Human Rights Practices 2016, Qatar)

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