by Our Sports Desk

QATAR has 12 months to “end the use of modern slavery” and overhaul its workers’ rights laws or else face a international inquiry into the shocking conditions in the Gulf despotism.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) issued the ultimatum after receiving an expert report into the disgusting treatment of workers in the monarchy.

International Trade Union Congress general secretary Sharan Burrow demanded that Qatar “end the use of modern slavery in the huge migrant workforce by bringing its laws in line with ILO standards.

“An immediate start is needed, to start treating the hundreds of thousands of migrant workers as human beings with human rights and end the appalling treatment of the people delivering its massive infrastructure programme — construction workers, domestic workers and those providing the services on which one of the world’s richest countries depends.”

Migrant workers make up over 90 per cent of Qatar’s population of two million people, most of them from Asia.

Qatar’s “kafala” system means migrant workers must have a sponsor, whose permission they need to change jobs or leave the country.

Many bosses confiscate their workers’ passports, despite this being illegal even under Qatar’s terrible laws.

Many migrant workers are building infrastructure for the 2022 football World Cup — which the Gulf state is accused of having bought.

They labour in dangerous conditions, and rights group Amnesty International’s most recent report says that, after finishing for the day, “thousands of workers in construction and related industries continued to live in dirty, overcrowded and often unsafe conditions.”