'This is what Qatar is like!': World Cup officials interrupt ANOTHER live broadcast, threaten to confiscate equipment and order TV crew to leave as they interview a fan in a wheelchair
- Officials interrupt live broadcast as reporter chats with fan, forcing crew to leave
- 'It's censorship when you know you're doing nothing wrong,' reporter's wife says
- Incident latest in string of Qatari officials appearing to censor journalists' work
This is the moment heavy-handed Qatari officials interrupt a live TV broadcast after telling an Argentinian journalist to stop filming as he interviews a football fan in a wheelchair.
A tall man in Arabic robes and headdress appeared out of nowhere and ordered Joaquin Alvarez to show him his press pass before instructing the cameraman to point his lens away towards a block of flats in the background.
Colleagues from the studio back in Buenos Aires said: 'This is what the Qatar government is like' as they expressed their concern at what was happening.
Heavy-handed Qatari officials arrive to interrupt a live TV broadcast after telling an Argentinian journalist to stop filming as he interviews a football fan in a wheelchair
The TV reporter tries to reason with the unnamed officials after they interrupt his live broadcas
The shock incident, which occurred after a Danish film crew were threatened by security staff on air as they broadcast in the capital Doha ahead of the World Cup, took place during a live report for a popular show on Argentina's El Trece channel called Nosotros a la Mañana.
Alvarez, who normally hosts the programme, was joking with Argentine fans about their favourite TV channel and the show they like the best when he was interrupted by the unidentified official and two other men who appeared seconds later.
He was forced to stop and show he was working seconds after a wheelchair-bound supporter he was fooling around with admitted he was 'sad' about the South American nation's shock defeat to Saudi Arabia in their first match of the tournament.
The interruption to the live broadcast took place in Barwa Village, a commercial and residential complex on the outskirts of Doha that was completed in 2010 and has been expanded for the World Cup.
The journalist and film crew resumed filming later from the back of a car, with Alvarez telling viewers he had been forced to leave the area after being told where he was working was 'private.'
Insisting his paperwork was in order and he had all the necessary permits, he said: 'I was frightened and thought they were going to take me prisoner.
'The person who stopped the filming got out of a van and told us in a very rude way we couldn't film any more because we were in a private place.
'I told him we were showing something nice but they told us we had to go and there was a moment when they even wanted to take our equipment off us.'