(TW) Gay Men Trapped, Raped, & Arrested By Police In Qatar

[RAMROD 117,011]

 

As the world focuses on visiting football fans, LGBT people who’ve lived in Qatar reveal what happens to them in secret when the media isn’t looking.

It was a trap — one that many gay men in Qatar have been lured into. Secretly, it’s discussed and warned about among the local LGBT community, but publicly, what’s really happening to sexual minorities, the scale and depth of state persecution, is not spoken about. Until today.

Ali is afraid to talk even now. Four years after that night he insists on seeing photo identification — proof I’m not an agent of the Qatari state but a certified member of the press — before saying a word. He asks for his name and certain identifying details to be changed or omitted to protect his identity, and then picks up the phone.

“I worked in Qatar as an office assistant,” he says. His voice sounds strong and lively, at first. “I have a friend from the Philippines, and he told me that there are a lot of LGBTs living in Qatar.” After he arrived, he saw gay men and trans women and even made some gay friends, who suggested Ali try using hook-up apps. “I thought, why not? Maybe I can find someone.” Others advised him to be careful.

It was early 2018 when a man messaged him on a gay dating app. “Then I received a call telling me he is interested to meet me,” says Ali. The man was Turkish, which seemed reassuring to Ali as he was probably just another foreign worker like him. He then offered Ali QR 300, roughly £70.

“But the condition was I had to go to his hotel, and he would bring a dress and makeup [for me to wear],” he says. “I decided to go.” Ali had never accepted money before, but this was an opportunity to top up his salary, much of which was already being sent home.

“When I saw the hotel, I entered inside. It was the tenth floor.” He walked straight ahead, down the corridor, and on the left was the room. “I opened the door, and I went inside. There are six people,” he says in the present tense, as if reliving the scene, “….there are six people…”

His voice cuts off. After a few seconds another voice comes on the line — it’s Ali’s best friend, who is here to support him during the interview. “Can I talk? He is crying.” While Ali tries to compose himself in the background, his friend, whom we’ll call Datu, takes over.

The six other men were, he says, Qatari police. “They captured him,” says Datu.

Ali starts to speak again. “I really wanted to jump [out] the window but I can’t, it’s too high and I’m already cornered inside the room,” he says.

“They catch me and threw me on the bed. They started to rape me.” When one officer was done, he says, another took over. “All of them except the Turkish [man] – he watched until they finished. He was laughing at me.”

“When they finished, they opened my bag and checked all my things, looking for proof, saying, ‘This is prostitute, this is gay’. So they had evidence.” One of them, he says, told him to shut up because he was crying, and slapped him across the face, on both sides. Ali was shaking, and in shock.

The officers, he says, must have messaged someone else on the app because an Indonesian gay man then arrived at the hotel room. They arrested him too and brought them both down to a waiting patrol car, drove them to the police station and questioned them.

Officers took pictures of the conversation Ali had had with the Turkish man as “evidence that he will pay me the QR 300,” he says. In other words, evidence of prostitution on top of homosexuality. “I slept in the jail for one night and when I woke up, they took me to the deportation centre. There I waited for two days to receive my passport and ticket to go back to the Philippines. They cancelled all my papers.”

Ali was deported. It was years before he could secure another job. After his return to Manila, he could barely function. “I stayed in bed thinking about what happened. Why did they do that? Why did they rape me?” He told his family, who already knew he was gay, but there was no other support for him. “I have trauma from what happened,” he says. He repeats this several times throughout the interview: trauma, trauma, trauma.

Far from being a one-off, Ali’s experiences form part of a much wider picture, hidden from view. Qatar’s laws criminalise LGBTQ people. All extra-marital relations in this near absolute monarchy are illegal. And homosexuality is punishable by imprisonment and lashings under sharia law. In the months leading up to the World Cup, media focus has been trained on those visiting the country — LGBT fans in particular — and the treatment they might receive as spectators. The British Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly, controversially told LGBT visitors to “be respectful” and “compromise”.

But the more permanent reality facing LGBT residents and Qatari nationals has been overlooked.

“Everyone is welcome,” Nasser Al Khater, CEO of the FIFA World Cup 2022, insisted when asked by CNN about the situation facing LGBT people in Qatar. “Public display of affection is frowned upon and that goes across the board. Qatar is a modest country. That’s all that needs to be respected. Other than that, everyone is free to live their life.”

This is not what those who have lived there told i. They spoke of entrapment using dating-apps — cat-fishing gay men and luring them into a honeytrap to arrest them. Of violence, including torture, and gang rape. Of imprisonment, solitary confinement, and deportations. And of far-reaching online surveillance by the authorities that renders LGBT people fearing every connection to someone they do not already know.

In a recent promotional video for the World Cup, its celebrity ambassador David Beckham, who was paid a reported £150m, can be seen gliding towards the Doha shore on a speedboat, riding a motorbike, wandering around a souk, and looking up in wonderment at the skyscrapers.

There is only one publicly out gay Qatari in the world: Dr Nasser Mohamed who talks to i on a video call from San Francisco where he now lives. When Dr Mohamed challenged Beckham on social media earlier this month, the former footballer blocked him on Instagram. “He doesn’t care,” says Mohamed of the man who once graced the cover of Attitude, the LGBT magazine, and spent years lapping up adoration from gay fans. “He’s doing it for the money.” Representatives for Beckham did not respond to i’s requests for comment.

 

There are a lot more, full article on link below if you6 interested: 

https://inews.co.uk/news/qatar-officials-gang-raped-gay-world-cup-hosts-lgbt-people-1949447

 

I am so saddened

No more respect to David Beckham. Trash.

Vic betta divorce him

 

[tomsches 17,550]

I love love love watching the football World Cup every 4 years. This year I am almost certain to boycott it. 

[RAMROD 117,011]

1 minute ago, tomsches said:

I love love love watching the football World Cup every 4 years. This year I am almost certain to boycott it. 

 

I am the same as you and with you. Will miss it this time.  See you in North America 2026!

[GagasLeftFoot 392]

I want to throw up. It's insane that tragedies like this still happen. Idc if it's against the rules but I wish the worst to every single person that raped Ali and everyone that would do something like that. I'm out of words. 

It's, also, weird because sometimes we, gay people, build our own communities and live in a bubble and it's shocking to be reminded that it's not safe everywhere. We have to keep fighting for our rights, for basic human rights. Nobody should ever have to go through what happened to Ali.

[gaga4lifer 266]

um can someone like shortly explain what happened i dont have the nerves to read the whole thing

[Pablo 8,577]

5 minutes ago, gab said:

um can someone like shortly explain what happened i dont have the nerves to read the whole thing

Quatar police used hookup apps to trick gay men and charge/deport them for prostitution. The article is about one man's experience where he was r@ped by multiple police officers at a hotel room.

[RudraCNG 15,506]

This is phucking disgusting. Remember all this celebrities and brands that are supporting this World Cup that will eventually pretend to be allies in June.

[PhantomOfTheDance 13,795]

Homophobes deserve to suffer in the worst ways possible. And I mean the worst.

[Flippy 14,249]

This is so terrible... 

Also, @RAMROD, I can't read the full article since it's a paid subscription. Is it possible for you to DM me the full article?  If not, I totally understand! 

[gaga4lifer 266]

KILL THOSE OFFICERS

[RAMROD 117,011]

3 hours ago, Flippy said:

This is so terrible... 

Also, @RAMROD, I can't read the full article since it's a paid subscription. Is it possible for you to DM me the full article?  If not, I totally understand! 

No problemo, sent.

[Controversiaga 15,991]

Wait these very officers raped them ???? So like they had sex with men, while arresting men who have sex with men ???? I’m so confused

this is awful 

[RAMROD 117,011]

18 minutes ago, RihBeyGa said:

Wait these very officers raped them ???? So like they had sex with men, while arresting men who have sex with men ???? I’m so confused

this is awful 

Yes, they did. But kept it between them so nobody else knows