Gay people in Qatar ‘used as undercover spies to hunt others down to avoid torture’
Gay Qataris have allegedly been told that if they help authorities track down other LGBQ+ people in the country they will be left alone and spared torture.
The news comes following claims made to the Guardian by a Qatari doctor and gay rights activist.
Dr Nasser Mohamed lives in the USA but is still in contact with a network of people in Qatar who are part of the LGBTQ+ community.
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He saidthat some underground networks had suffered exposure following efforts from Qatar’s preventative security force.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Human Rights Watch said last month that the force had been randomly arresting people who are part of the LGBTQ+ community.
They also flagged, between 2019 and 2022, six cases of beatings and five of sexual harassment in police custody.
Mohammed also said that gay foreign nationals travelling to the World Cup would not be persecuted.
Mohamed told the publication: “A lot [of gay Qataris] don’t know about each other.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
“And it’s safer that way because when the law enforcement finds one person, they actively try to find their entire network.”
Chillingly, he added that if a person is found to be gay by law enforcement, efforts will have been known to be made to find more people by using the person originally arrested.
“But some of the people who were captured and physically abused were then recruited as agents.
“Now there are agents in the gay community that were promised safety from physical torture in exchange for working for the preventive security department and helping them find groups of LGBTQ+ people.”
Describing the difficulties faced by gay Qataris on a day-to-day basis, Mohammed said: “What is it like to be an LGBT Qatari? You live in fear, you live in the shadows, you’re actively persecuted. You’re subjected to state-sponsored physical and mental abuse. It’s dangerous to be an LGBT person in Qatar.”
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