Qatar opened on Monday a state department to deal with human rights complaints in the US-allied Gulf Arab state. "We will follow up on cases reported to us by people who are concerned about human rights' violations," Major Abdullah Saqr al-Muhenidi, director of the Interior Ministry's new human rights department, told reporters.
The United States has pressed its allies in the Middle East to reform, saying a lack of freedom had fostered Islamic militancy.
A US report in June criticised Qatar along with three other Gulf states as the worst offenders in allowing human trafficking. Doha has said it would introduce measures to combat the practice.
Qatar, which hosted the US advance headquarters in the 2003 war on Iraq, has a state-funded but officially independent National Human Rights Committee.