FIFA 2022 World Cup

India will train Qatar's police for the FIFA World Cup 2022. This was agreed upon during a meeting between Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Nasser Bin Khalifa Al Thani and Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Delhi on Saturday. The Prime Minister, who holds the Interior Ministry portfolio, invited Mr Singh to Qatar to strengthen bilateral security cooperation as the country prepares to host the FIFA World Cup 2022.

Efforts to leverage Qatar’s 2022 World Cup hosting rights to create the soft power the Gulf state needs to punch above its weight and ensure a sympathetic hearing in the international community in times of emergency operate on the Leninist principle of two steps forward, one step backwards.

The soccer soft power contrast between Qatar and Iceland speaks volumes. A comparison of the strategies of both countries demonstrates that it takes more than money to leverage soccer to create political, geopolitical and economic opportunity. Money and world soccer body FIFA’s desire to take one of the world’s foremost sporting events beyond Europe and the Americas helped Qatar win the right to host the 2022 World Cup.

Widely viewed as a shrewd financial investor, Qatar's return on investment in soft power designed to position it as a progressive ally of world powers in the hope that they will come to the aid of the wealthy Gulf state in times of emergency is proving to be abysmal. [...] the payback in Qatar's reputation, attitudes of law enforcement-related governmental agencies, non-governmental organizations, including trade unions and human rights groups and the public, and media headlines has been everything but congratulatory.

The ministry said: "All of the actions that have been taken against the two Britons are consistent with the principles of human rights enshrined in the Constitution and the laws of the State of Qatar," according to QNA. "There is a direct contact between the Qatari Foreign Ministry and the investigating authorities with the British Embassy in Doha in this regard," the agency added. Qatar came under heavy criticism early this year over reported violations of the rights of migrants workers building 2022 World Cup projects.

Qatar’s World Cup organizers view this ground as a blank canvas for a new era in the Middle East, a way to advance their society and use soft power—i.e., the world’s most popular sport—to promote the country’s foreign policy.

A disclosure by British weekly The Sunday Times of millions of documents allegedly revealing massive Qatari vote buying in the Gulf state's successful bid to host the 2022 World Cup could rejigger the Gulf's fragile balance of power, reverse hopes that Qatar would initiate significant social change in the region, and return the worst corruption crisis in global soccer governance to the top of the agenda.