Qatar – Eleven people were killed and 12 were injured in a fire that broke out in housing for migrant laborers working on a tourism project in Qatar, authorities said late Thursday.
The Interior Ministry said that the fire erupted late Wednesday in housing used by one of the companies working on the Salwa tourism project in the south of the country. It said that 12 people were hospitalized.
The ministry did not provide details on the identities of the victims. Qatari officials did not immediately respond to a request for further comment. The cause of the blaze is under investigation.
Wednesdays fire was believed to be the deadliest in Qatar since a 2012 blaze at the high-end Villaggio shopping mall in the capital, Doha. That fire killed 19 people, including 13 children, many of them foreigners.
The fire is likely to intensify scrutiny of conditions for low-wage guest workers in the wealthy Gulf nation, which is being transformed by billions of dollars worth of construction projects as it prepares to host the 2022 World Cup.
Rights groups have repeatedly criticized Qatars treatment of foreign workers, who are effectively bound to their employer under a sponsorship system that activists say leaves employees open to abuse. Qatar has enacted some labor reforms and plans to implement others, but many workers still sleep in crowded, substandard housing.
Many migrant workers in Qatar come from South Asian countries including India and Nepal, as well as parts of Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
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