Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery Poverty drives the unsuspecting poor into the
hands of traffickers Published reports & articles
from 2000 to 2025 gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Kuwait.htm
Kuwait is a
destination country for men and women trafficked for the purposes of forced
labor. The majority of trafficking victims are from among the over 500,000
foreign women recruited for domestic service work in Kuwait. Men and women
migrate from Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Indonesia, Pakistan,
and Bangladesh in search of work in the domestic and sanitation industries.
Although they migrate willingly to Kuwait, upon arrival some are subjected to
conditions of forced labor from their “sponsors” and labor agents, such as
withholding of passports, confinement, physical sexual abuse and threats of
such abuse or other serious harm, and non-payment of wages with the intent of
compelling their continued service. Adult female migrant workers are
particularly vulnerable, and consequently are often victims of sexual
exploitation and forced prostitution.
- U.S. State Dept Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2009 Check
out a later country report here or a full TIP Report here |
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CAUTION: The following
links have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in HOW TO USE THIS WEB-PAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspects of Human Trafficking are of
particular interest to you. Would you
like to write about Forced-Labor? Debt
Bondage? Prostitution? Forced Begging? Child Soldiers? Sale of Organs? etc. On the other
hand, you might choose to include precursors of trafficking such as poverty and
hunger. There is a lot to the subject of Trafficking. Scan other countries as well. Draw comparisons between activity in
adjacent countries and/or regions.
Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper
resources that are available on-line. Teachers Check out some of
the Resources for Teachers attached to this
website. ***
FEATURED ARTICLE *** Forced Labor and
Debt Bondage Human Rights Watch
Global Report on Women's Human Rights, 1995 www2.webster.edu/~woolflm/forcedlabor.html [accessed 13 June
2013] [scroll down] ***
ARCHIVES *** Woman tells police
she escaped human trafficking situation in downtown Cleveland, police reports
say Adam Ferrise, cleveland.com, 26 October 2019 [accessed 27 October
2019] She told police she
was scared and asked to leave the area, police reports say. She told the
officers that she was sold four years ago to a family in Kuwait in order to
take care of that family’s sick, elderly relative, according to police
reports. That family on Aug.
12 traveled to Cleveland so the elderly woman could get treatment at the
Cleveland Clinic, according to police reports. She told police
that the family locked her in an apartment in Cleveland for two months.
Cleveland’s law department redacted the address of the apartment and other
information from police reports. The woman told the
officers she never had a chance to escape or call 911 until that day. She
said the family was always around, and when they weren’t, they’d lock her in
a bedroom in the apartment, according to police reports. She also was
forbidden from talking to anyone when they were in public, according to
police reports. 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Kuwait U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/kuwait/
[accessed 13 June
2021] PROHIBITION OF
FORCED OR COMPULSORY LABOR Domestic servitude
was the most common type of forced labor, principally involving foreign
domestic workers employed under kafala, but reports
of forced labor in the construction and sanitation sectors also existed.
Forced labor conditions for migrant workers included nonpayment of wages,
long working hours, deprivation of food, threats, physical and sexual abuse, and
restrictions on movement, such as withholding passports or confinement to the
workplace. As of November private sector and domestic labor employers filed
approximately 15,000 reports claiming that employees “absconded.” Domestic
workers filed approximately 425 complaints against their employers in
accordance with the domestic labor law. As of November, PAM statistics
indicated that 2634 domestic helper-related complaints had been filed.
Numerous domestic workers who escaped from abusive employers reported waiting
several months to regain passports, which employers had illegally confiscated
when they began their employment. In July the PAM announced it would no
longer accept private sector complaints over absenteeism, after reports some
employers were filing them maliciously as a pretext to violate labor laws. PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT Although not
extensive, there were credible reports that children of South Asian origin
worked as domestic laborers. Some underage workers entered the country on
travel documents with falsified birth dates. Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/kuwait/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 8 July
2020] G4. DO INDIVIDUALS
ENJOY EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY AND FREEDOM FROM ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION? Foreign household
workers and other migrant workers are highly vulnerable to abuse and
exploitation, often forced to live and work in poor or dangerous conditions
for low pay. Many employers reportedly confiscate their household workers’
passports, subject them to excessive working hours, and restricted their
movements outside the home. A 2015 law strengthened the rights of such
domestic workers, including the right to paid leave and limits on working
hours, but implementation remains problematic. International media
reports during 2019 highlighted a number of cases in which recruiting agents held
female migrant workers for ransom, demanding money from their families before
they could return home. Other workers have been repatriated from Kuwait by
the state labor bureau after being refused payment or otherwise harassed or
abused by their employers. At least two domestic workers from the Philippines
were reported to have been murdered during the year. Cameroonians
Rescued From Human Traffickers Moki Edwin Kindzeka, Voice of America VOA News, 10 July 2015 m.voanews.com/a/cameroonians-rescued-from-human-traffickers/2856737.html [accessed 12 July
2015] As some 50
Cameroonian women recover in a trauma center from their ordeals of forced
labor in Middle East homes, calls are resounding for the central African
nation’s government to investigate and prosecute the human traffickers
allegedly responsible for their plight. Some of the women
said they were deceived by television ads claiming there was work in Kuwait
for domestic help, nurses and airport employees. Claudette Amikeh, 27, said she was treated like a slave during a
year in Kuwait. She complained of little time to sleep and, "at times,
no food, [only] stress." Amikeh said she begged to
be returned to Cameroon, but "this woman said I am going nowhere: I have
come to work, I must work. I went down on my knees…. I cried to God for help.
I prayed and cried." Beatrice Titanji, who runs the trauma center, said these human
traffickers also collect an advance salary of $3,000 from Middle East people
who contract for the women’s services. They don’t give the money to the
women. 200 Kuwaitis, 40
firms blacklisted over human trafficking kuwaitnepalnews.wordpress.com/kuwait-crime-news/ [accessed 30 April
2020] [scroll down] HUMAN TRADERS, FIRMS
BANNED
- Two hundred Kuwaitis and 40 companies have been blacklisted and banned from
recruiting domestic laborers due to their alleged involvement in human
trafficking, Al-Watan Arabic daily quoted informed
sources as saying. Meanwhile, 500
expatriates were arrested for violating the residency law and were referred
to authorities. Governing Justly
and Combating Human Trafficking: The Linkages Mark P. Lagon, Director, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking
in Persons, Remarks at the Freedom House-SAIS "Human Trafficking and
Freedom" Event, 2001-2009.state.gov/g/tip/rls/rm/07/96171.htm [accessed 10 July
2013] In many countries
in the Xinhua www.twocircles.net/2007jun27/kuwait_lashes_u_s_human_rights_report.html [accessed 17
February 2011] Rejecting the
accusation made by the U.S. report saying Kuwaitis running human trafficking
in an excuse of reducing global joblessness, the committee said in the
statement that "The State of Kuwait opens its arms to those incoming
workers and even provides them with all available job opportunities, unlike
many other countries which combat and deport them on the grounds of fighting
illegal immigration." "By
doing so, Kuwait ought to be commended, appreciated and even placed on an
honors list," it added. Human trafficking www.kuwaittimes.net/read_news.php?newsid=OTY4NzI4NjQw [accessed 28
November 2010] New labor
regulations and civilized working laws that leave no place for the sponsor's
moods and thoughts must be enforced. One issue that many maids complain about
is that they have no rights in deciding their place of work meaning they have
no say when their sponsor moves them from one house to another, like the
house of a sponsor's relative or friend. If we had a clear
law to prevent their sponsors from acting freely in this matter, many
troubles could be solved in this regard. Not all sponsors are doing this, but
some are so we have to think about how to eliminate such actions. Giving a
day off for a maid seems a small issue but it was a problem for many maids here.
House maids are not supposed to work around the clock and their rights in
these matters must be clear and must be respected by their sponsors. The wages and the
means of payment are also problems for many workers and they need a policy to
protect their rights and not only the sponsor's rights. These matters started
as a molehill but have now turned into a mountain because there has never
been a visible solution to handle it over the years. The sponsorship system
needs a quick revision and update based on international laws and human
rights laws especially regarding working hours and wages with days off. New study shames
human traffickers Patrick Mathangani, The Standard, May 11, 2007 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 7
September 2011] Countries in the A new report by an
international trade unions’ umbrella organisation
says Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, United
Arab Emirates and Yemen are notorious destinations for women trafficked from
Kenya. Its report,
‘Trafficking in Persons — The Eastern Africa Situation’, notes that women and
children were favourite targets for well-organised trafficking rings, which operate freely for
lack of solid laws against the vice. Two sides of
women's oppression Sara Flounders,
Workers World newspaper, March 11, 2004 www.workers.org/ww/2004/women0311.php [accessed 17
February 2011] www.workers.org/ww/2004/women0311.php [accessed 4 February
2018] DISMANTLING
GUARANTEED RIGHTS
- In these societies women are literally slaves, imprisoned in the home and
held captive within a repressive patriarchal system. They have no right to
work or control their own funds or even to drive a car. They cannot even
travel unaccompanied by a male family member. They have no right to vote or
to participate in any form of political life. In Kuwait, Saudi
Arabia and throughout the oil-rich Gulf states, women have no rights that any
man is bound to respect. They have no right to decide who they will marry,
nor do they have a right to divorce, even from an abusive husband. Education is
separate--and so unequal that most women in oil-rich Saudi Arabia are still
illiterate. Ansar Burney Trust
rescues two more 'Child Camel Jockeys' in UAE At one time this article
had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 7
September 2011] The Ansar Burney Welfare Trust International is the only
human rights organisation working since last
several years practically against slave labour in Slavery
of Children and women in Morteza Aminmansour,
Persian Journal, Jun 20, 2004 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 7
September 2011] Exact number of
victims is impossible to obtain, but according to an official source in UAE,
there has been increase in the number of teen-age girls in prostitution
(forced to work from Campaigning against
Bonded Labour International
Federation of Workers' Education Associations IFWEA Journal, December 2000 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 7
September 2011] MIGRANT DOMESTIC
WORKERS - The experience of Despite Alice’s
qualification as a civil engineer in Manila, the pay was not enough to
support her and her family. She
answered an advert recruiting engineers to Kuwait offering 215 Pounds per
month -- six times her Philippine salary.
Against her expected salary her family borrowed money so she could pay
the agency's fee, half of which was due before leaving Manila. Upon arriving in Kuwait City she found that
there were no civil engineering posts, only jobs for maids at a salary
considerably less than she was promised.
With no money to pay the agency or to pay for the flight back home,
she had no choice but to sign a contract to work as a domestic. Her day began at
5:30am and only ended once all of the adults had gone to bed, which was
regularly after 2am. She had no time
off, not even to go to church or to write letters home. After two and a
half years in Kuwait Alice was taken to London. Following an attack in which her employer
tried to rape her she fled. It was the first time she had been out of the
house. The New Slavery Kevin Bales,
"Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy" [accessed 17
February 2011] WHAT DOES RACE HAVE
TO DO WITH IT? - It is true that in some countries there
are ethnic or religious differences between slaves and slaveholders. In
Pakistan, for example, many enslave brickmakers are
Christians while the slaveholders are Muslim. In India slave and slaveholder
may be from different castes. In Thailand they may come from different
regions of the country and are much more likely to be women. But in Pakistan
there are Christians who are not slaves, in India members of the same caste
who are free. Their caste or religion simply reflects their vulnerability to
enslavement; it doesn't cause it. Only in one country, Mauritania, does the racism
of the old slavery persist -- there black slaves are held by Arab
slaveholders, and race is a key division. To be sure, some cultures are more
divided along racial lines than others. Japanese culture strongly
distinguishes the Japanese as different from everyone else, and so enslaved
prostitutes in Japan are more likely to be Thai, Philippine, or European
women -- although they may be Japanese. Even here, the key difference is not
racial but economic: Japanese women are not nearly so vulnerable and desperate
as Thais or Filipinas. And the Thai women are available for shipment to Japan
because Thais are enslaving Thais. The
same pattern occurs in the oil-rich states of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, where Muslim Arabs promiscuously enslave
Sri Lankan Hindus, Filipino Christians, and Nigerian Muslims. The common
denominator is poverty, not color. Behind every assertion of ethnic
difference is the reality of economic disparity. A death sentence
for a young Filipino maid highlights the problem of abuse of Asian servants Michael S. Serrill, Reported by Scott MacLeod/Al-Ain and Nelly Sindayen/Manila, TIME, October 23, 1995 housemaidsabuse.blogspot.com/2011/05/death-sentence-for-young-filipino-maid.html [accessed 17
February 2011] Despite the
settlement, the case cast a spotlight on a dark practice throughout the Worse, the maids
find themselves in virtual bondage to their employers, who almost without
exception confiscate the servants' passports to prevent them from walking out
before fulfilling their typical two-year contract. It is common for the maids
to be forced to work from dawn to midnight, seven days a week. Often they are
fed scraps and leftovers, are beaten and verbally abused and, in the worst
cases, raped and murdered. Only in the most egregious instances is an
employer ever charged with sexual abuse or assault. The Overthrow Of
The www.rense.com/general35/skolov30.htm [accessed 17
February 2011] Point by point, I
discussed the findings of a unit of the United Nations which had documented a
terrible truth. Here it was, late in the 20th Century, I told the crowd, that
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, according to undisputed details of the U.N. unit,
each had huge numbers of BLACK CHATTEL SLAVES. Saudi, according to the
findings, had about one hundred thousand such slaves and Kuwait about fifty
thousand of the same. Work Worries -
Women going abroad to work is leading to more human trafficking Lanka Business
Online, 04 Mar 2005 www.lankabusinessonline.com/fullstory.php?nid=1777048731 [accessed 17
February 2011] www.lankabusinessonline.com/work-worries/ [accessed 11
February 2019] Sri Lankan women
are trafficked to Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar, mainly as sex workers or for
forced labor. Concluding
Observations of the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights [PDF] UN COMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC,
SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS CESCR, Thirty-second session, 26 April-14 May 2004
– Distributed 7 June 2004 www.arabhumanrights.org/publications/countries/kuwait/cescr/cescr-e-c12-1-add98-04e.pdf [accessed 2
September 2014] www.refworld.org/publisher,CESCR,CONCOBSERVATIONS,KWT,4153f9734,0.html [accessed 4 February
2018] [41] The Committee
recommends that the State party take effective measures to combat trafficking
in persons, especially in women and children, by ensuring, inter alia, that
those responsible for trafficking are prosecuted, and to ratify the Protocol
to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and
Children, of 2001. The Committee recommends that the State party establish
support services for victims of trafficking and take steps to sensitize law
enforcement officials and the general public to the gravity of this issue. Human Rights
Overview Human Rights Watch www.hrw.org/middle-eastn-africa/kuwait [accessed 17
February 2011] ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, March 8, 2006 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61692.htm [accessed 9 February
2020] TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
– The country is a destination for men, women, and children trafficked
primarily from The physical or
sexual abuse of foreign women working as domestic servants was a problem.
Some employers physically abused foreign women working as domestic servants,
and despite economic and social difficulties for a domestic servant to lodge
a complaint, these women continued to report such abuse. The local press
devoted considerable attention to the problem, and both the police and courts
have taken action against employers when presented with evidence of serious
abuse. Some rapes resulted in pregnancies, and there were reports of illegal
abortions. Occasionally domestic workers were charged with assaulting their
employers; in such cases the workers claimed that they acted in response to
physical abuse or poor working conditions. Human Rights
Reports » 2003 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27931.htm [accessed 9 February
2020] WOMEN - There were some
reports of women, mainly from All
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