5 Australian Women Sue Qatar Over Invasive Searches at Airport

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/21/world/australia/qatar-airways-women-searches.html

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MELBOURNE, Australia — Five Australian women have sued the Qatari government two years after they were pulled off a plane and subjected to invasive medical procedures as part of an investigation into the abandonment of a newborn in an airport bathroom.

While Qatar has said it will review the protocols, the women say they want the country to enact policy changes to prevent a repeat of what happened to them.

Their lawyer, Damian Sturzaker, said that court papers were filed in Australia last week and served to the state-owned Qatar Airways on Thursday, and that legal papers would also be sent to Qatar’s Civil Aviation Authority. The women are seeking unspecified damages and costs.

Qatar Airways, the aviation authority and the government communications office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The five women were among more than a dozen who were escorted off a Qatar Airways flight by guards carrying guns after the newborn was found at Hamad International Airport, in the Qatari capital, Doha, in October 2020.

Some of them were forced to remove their underwear and subjected to an invasive examination to see if they had recently given birth, one of the women told The New York Times in 2020, while older women had their stomachs pressed.

The five women, whose ages range from 33 to 75, are suing Qatar Airways and the Civil Aviation Authority over what they call unlawful physical contact and mental trauma that has continued to this day.

All five suffered or continue to suffer from illnesses like anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, according to documents filed in Supreme Court in the Australian state of New South Wales. The women’s names have been suppressed by the court.

One of them, a 33-year-old nurse, said in an interview that she had not traveled since. “It completely changed me as a person, that day,” she said.

“It seems like they’ve just moved on, they’re not sorry for it,” she added. “They’re going on with their lives normally while we’re all here, quite affected. It’s really unfair.”

Previously, the women wrote to the Qatari authorities and filed a complaint with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, in which they claimed that their human rights had been breached. That complaint remains open.

Following a preliminary investigation, the Qatar government said in a statement that “specialized task forces” were reviewing protocols at the airport to identify potential gaps, “address them and ensure that any violations are avoided in the future.”

The prime minister, Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani, conveyed a “sincerest apology for what some female travelers went through as a result of the measures.”

The nurse said that the women were looking for “personalized and meaningful” apologies that addressed the trauma they suffered and continue to suffer. In addition, she said, they wanted proof, not just assurances, that protocols would be changed.

“They’ve assured us that laws have changed and that a situation like this won’t arise again, but we haven’t seen any proof of that, so we don’t believe anything has changed,” she said.

The legal documents say that the women are suing Qatar Airways under the Montreal Convention, in which a carrier is liable for bodily damage to passengers, and that “an action for damages resulting from death or injury can be brought before the courts at the place of destination of the aircraft.”

When the women’s treatment was first reported, it sparked outrage and disbelief in Australia, with the foreign minister at the time condemning it as a “grossly, grossly disturbing, offensive, concerning set of events.”

The Qatari government said in a statement at the time that it “regrets any distress or infringement on the personal freedoms of any traveler caused by this action.” It added that the “aim of the urgently decided search was to prevent the perpetrators of the horrible crime from escaping.”

Qatar’s human rights record is under renewed scrutiny as it prepares to host the soccer World Cup in November. It is facing questions over whether it will welcome gay fans and over the deaths of migrant workers in construction projects related to the cup.

Livia Albeck-Ripka contributed reporting.