Nesrine Malik is correct: Putin’s Russia does “hunt” its exiled dissidents (It’s not just Qatar hoping we now ‘put politics aside’. It’s the hypocritical west, too, 21 November). Saudi Arabia does so too, for example Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Yet Saudi Arabia still gets to host a Formula One grand prix, so-called Clash on the Dunes boxing matches, and international golfing. The 2012 Bahrain grand prix went ahead amid torture and the shooting dead of unarmed protesters. Malik is also right to stress that our governments arm the Gulf states, provide them with surveillance technology, PR, political and diplomatic cover, and – in a situation where sovereign wealth is often hard to distinguish from private hyper-wealth – safe havens for blood money.
In return for turning a blind eye to grotesque human rights abuses and institutional homophobia and misogyny, “we” get cheap hydrocarbons, “inward investment” that melds our economy with those of the Gulf states, a regional “security” stance and, in the case of Bahrain, a Royal Navy base. Gulf sportswashing has a wider context, and it is a sad reflection on us that human rights abuses only occasionally come to the fore during sporting events, and media debate is so often mired in anti-Arab racism.
