The former prime minister of Qatar has denied claims that his country paid large bribes to win the right to host the 2022 World Cup and accused the west of racism, Islamophobia and bias against Arabs and the Gulf state.

Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani, who was prime minister and foreign minister of Qatar until 2013, said that claims of corruption against his nation had been made by countries that had lost out in “a fair competition”.

“See how they don’t talk about Russia with Qatar,” Sheikh al-Thani told Fox News yesterday. “We support of course Russia, to have their turn in 2018. But we see the talk . . . is all about Qatar, because it comes to a small, Arab, Islamic