A Qatar World Cup ambassador has described homosexuality as “damage in the mind” just two weeks before the tournament gets underway.
The comments were made by former Qatari international Khalid Salman in an interview filmed in Doha for German television broadcaster ZDF. “They have to accept our rules here,” he said of LGBTQ+ fans travelling to see the World Cup. “[Homosexuality] is haram.
You know what haram means?” When asked why it was “haram”, meaning forbidden, Salman added: “I am not a strict Muslim but why is it haram?
Because it is damage in the mind.” ZDF immediately terminated the interview, with Germany’s interior minister Nancy Faeser calling the remarks “terrible”.