By Paul Kelso, Sports Correspondent
Complaints about the treatment of migrant workers in Qatar are "a dirty game" to discredit the country, a senior government minister has told Sky News.
Human rights groups and trade unions have raised concerns over the treatment of migrant labourers driving the construction boom in Qatar, with the government admitting that almost 1,000 workers from Nepal, India and Bangladesh died in 2012 and 2013.
There are concerns that without reform, many more could die as construction on 2022 World Cup facilities accelerates in the coming months and years.
In an interview with Sky's economics editor Ed Conway, however, Abdullah bin Hamad al Attiyah, a former advisor to the Emir of Qatar and now president of the Administrative Control & Transparency Authority, said critics had "a heightened agenda".
"I think this is a big trick. People start talking about human rights, they just have a heightened agenda and they just try and use it against Qatar. This is what I call the dirty game," he said.
"Just to come only to talk about human rights. What of the human rights in Israel? What of the human rights in Europe? What about human rights in America? Why are you just talking about a small country trying to create a scapegoat and try to blame it just as human rights?
"I believe we have a lot of nationalities who work in Qatar who save their family and their own home. We create millions of jobs for people who come. And they can buy their choice. No one forced them."
The minister's comments are in contrast to the official government line, and the position of the Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee, which says it has committed to a series of measures to improve worker safety.
Migrant workers make up around 75% of Qatar's 1.9 million population, with many of them employed under the kafala system, under which labourers cannot change job or leave the country without permission from their sponsor.
Qatar 2022 has introduced a code of conduct for companies wishing to secure World Cup contracts worth an estimated £100m.
These include agreeing to audits of workers' conditions and guarantees on pay.
The standards set by Qatar 2022 do not apply to wider infrastructure projects, and Amnesty International believe that Abdullah bin Hamad al Attiyah's comments suggest that the government is only paying lip-service to reform.
"It is very surprising to hear claims like this from a senior member of the Qatari government when we have been told in public several times that the Qatari government does accept there is a problem," said James Lynch of Amnesty.
"This would seem to indicate there is division in the government or there is a difference between the public line and what people really think.
"Time is running out for this World Cup to be built free of exploitation. If you still have senior government ministers refusing to accept that there is a problem that does not bode well at all."
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