Chen’s article notes the substancial obstacles to migrants’ progress, as well as on-going mistreatment. However, we can be cautiously optimistic that at the least, conditions are more favorable to migrant rights than they have ever been before; if new institutions are more responsive to civil society, then there is certainly opportunity for homegrown organizations to develop and lobby legislatures for fair foreign labor practices. Democratically elected regimes may also hold international law in higher regard and act more responsively to IGOs and NGOS such as the ILO and HRW, both of which advocate legal safeguards on behalf of migrant workers.

But only time and tangible change on the ground will tell. Migrant-Rights.org will closely monitor the status of migrants as these new governments develop.

Please watch and share this video widely. Special thanks to Farah Salka from the Anti Racism Movement for her assistance.

To understand the severity of the situation, you can follow @MigrantRights on Twitter, which contains constant updates of migrant rights abuses in the region as well as this page on CrowdVoice:

We have created this PSA animation to note that for far too long, migrant workers have been an invisible majority in the Middle East. They are rarely discussed in the media and receive little protection from the governments of host countries, many of whom have no clear policies for safeguarding their welfare.

Please watch the video and spread the word.

We want to thank Eric Epstein, without whom this video would not be possible. Eric voluntarily created this video with us on his own time. His hard work throughout this process demonstrate his strong belief in our cause, and we are extremely thankful for his generosity and support. It means a lot to us.

We would also like to recognize the following people for their outstanding assistance in this video:

Original Music: Skeleton Suit
Hand-drawn Animation: Jaron Eugene Newton
CG Elements: Zach Shukan

Thank you very much for helping us make the world aware of human rights abuses against migrant workers in the Middle East.

Below is the ad in today’s paper:

The Kuwait Times interviewed two of the workers who fell from balconies in Kuwait and are now recovering from their injuries. They described a life full of hard work, and mental, physical, and sexual abuse from their sponsors, as well as constant sleep deprivation, which drove them to commit suicide in one case, or to try to escape in the other. These stories show the real causes of this massive trend among maids of “falling” from balconies in Kuwait and other countries in the region.

Dying to escape: the desperation of Kuwait’s abused maids

Published Date: January 05, 2010
By Ben Garcia, Staff Writer

KUWAIT: Thirteen suicides of migrant workers were documented in Kuwait in November 2009 alone by Migrant Rights, an international organization for migrant workers. According to the Migrant Rights webpage, not a week goes by in Kuwait without a report about a maid setting herself on fire, hanging herself, drinking detergent, or mysteriously ‘falling’ from a roof or balcony.

In investigating this phenomenon, the Kuwait Times spoke with two Filipina housemaids, ‘Elena’ and ‘Veronica’ (not their real names), who are currently receiving treatment in Al-Razi Hospital after jumping from their sponsors’ second floor apartments. Both women’s ‘falls’ which resulted in their hospitalization were reportedly recorded as suicide attempts and would have been recorded as successful suicides, had they died. Both women survived, however, and told their stories to the Kuwait Times.

Elena began by explaining that on December 30, she requested permission from her sponsor’s wife to take a day off on January 1, New Year’s Day. The sponsor’s wife initially agreed to her request, but on December 31 apparently changed her mind, telling Elena that after incurring her husband’s disapproval over some unspecified action the day off had been canceled.

The woman then said something to Elena which the maid did not catch, leading to her asking the ‘lady’ politely if she could repeat the words in English. The woman misinterpreted Elena’s request as disrespectful, flying into a rage and being verbally abusive and offensive.

I tried to pacify my female employer,” Elena explained. “I told her I was sorry and said that I wasn’t going to go out any more this New Year. But she kept going on, so I told her that she could send me back to my agency instead. I got my bag, but before I could leave my room she called my male boss and told him that I was getting wild – of course this wasn’t true. She told me to stay in one corner until my male boss arrived. When he arrived, they talked in Arabic and after a while he stood over me and hit my head three times, telling me that I couldn’t leave and had to work for them for two years. My male boss only stopped when his wife intervened.

Elena broke off, understandably still emotionally traumatized after her ordeal, before continuing. “Right after that incident, I called my agency and told them to get me away from my sponsor. But the secretary at the agency told me to stay and forget the punch to my head, saying that it had only happened because of my stupidity and that the pain would go away anyway.

After the incident, the sponsors locked Elena inside their second-floor apartment in Dasma before going out, instructing her to carry out her duties or face further punishment. “When they left, I tried to think of a better way to escape,” Elena explained. “When I looked down from the second floor, it was high and I couldn’t think of a better way to escape but to shout while holding onto the window frame. I thought the people from the first floor could hear me anyway and they’d help. I did as I planned and while I was hanging out the window a lady from the first floor tried hard to rescue me; she provided me with a ladder, but I lost my grip of the window frame and fell.

Elena, who sustained multiple bone fractures, in her hands, hips and legs in the fall, is scheduled to undergo a major operation today. Her sponsors, meanwhile, turned up at the hospital not out of concern for her, but to tell her that they had filed a case against her for attempted suicide and for stealing valuables, although the few goods that Elena has are inside her suitcase – which they packed and brought to the hospital with them for her.

My sponsor gave the bag to me; it’s in my [hospital] locker right now, but I haven’t opened it yet,” Elena said. “My madam told me that I took valuable things from their house and that she has filed a case with the police against me. I’m not worried because I don’t do such things. There is a [security] camera inside their house anyway, so how could I steal valuables?

Elena, who is married with three children back home in the Philippines, arrived in Kuwait on March 25, 2009. In fact, this couple were Elena’s second sponsors after she left her first job because, she says, the male sponsor there sexually harassed her.

‘Veronica,’ meanwhile, is currently recuperating at Al-Razi Hospital after being rushed there on November 19 last year after falling from a window of her employers’ second-storey apartment in the Salem area during an escape attempt that went horribly wrong. While attempting to lower herself to the ground using blankets knotted together, Veronica instead fell on the downstairs apartment’s balcony, breaking both legs and doing serious damage to her spine.

Veronica’s case is even worse than Elena’s. She told the Kuwait Times that her boss had refused to pay her her wages for a year after ‘buying’ her from the recruitment agency for KD 600. “I remember when I was due for my first month’s salary, I told her that I could repay the KD 600 perhaps, but not right away since I have my own family to feed back home,” Veronica said, tears welling in her eyes. “She didn’t want to give me anything. But I went down on my knees to her, saying that my family needs the money desperately. I knew that I was degrading myself immensely, but that was the only way to convince my employer that I was serious about getting my salary. I did that and I can do that for my kids.

Eventually, Veronica said, escaping through an open window was the only way she could see of saving her life and sanity since her employer would always lock the main door of the apartment, as well as exposing her to constant and brutal violence.

Many times my boss would punch me in the head, even for a very small mistake,” she continued. “As well as this, they gave me only noodles to eat. If they went out to restaurant, they might bring me leftovers. If their children refused to eat, my boss wouldn’t give me any noodles to eat as a punishment for their kids not eating.

As with Elena, Veronica’s employers have also brought a charge of attempted suicide against her. According to both women, however, the CCTV cameras in their sponsors’ homes will reveal the truth.

Elena and Veronica both said that as well as being expected to perform all the housework and other maids’ duties, they were also expected to act as nannies to their sponsors’ children, with Elena’s wards being aged seven, five and two, while Veronica’s sponsors’ children were aged four, one-and-a-half and six months. The women were expected to take full responsibility for the children, day and night, with both saying that they were allowed only three to four hours’ sleep per night.

1. Death of Domestic Migrant Workers in Lebanon
This story is significant not just because of the sheer number of deaths and their alarming frequency, but also because it drew the attention of human rights organizations, international media outlets and governments to the abuse domestic workers suffer in Lebanon. Following the string of suicides in October 2009, Nepal banned its women from working in Lebanon and a court in Lebanon sentenced an employer to a short prison sentence and a fine for abusing her maid. Domestic workers in Lebanon are still not protected under Lebanon’s Labor Law and the Sponsorship system makes them almost completely dependent on their employer.

2. Changes in Bahrain’s Sponsorship System
While we judge that the proclamations about the “abolishing” or “axing” of the Sponsorship System were premature in Bahrain, the changes instituted in September of this year are a significant step forward. Expatriate workers who were previously chained to one sponsor and depended on him to stay in the country, can now switch sponsors, even if their sponsor objects. This in theory ensures that abused workers, or those who are not properly compensated, can switch to a better sponsor instead of losing their residency. Unfortunately, the new law does not apply to the most vulnerable of migrants – domestic workers.

3. The Dark Side of the UAE’s Construction Boom
Like our number one pick, this is also a heavily-covered phenomenon, that has been reported in the press and by human rights organization. The financial crisis has resulted in many migrant workers, especially construction workers, losing their jobs in the UAE. Those workers are often in debt to the agents who provided them with a working visa, and are forced to stay in the UAE and work illegally, trying to cover those debts.
Others who have managed to retain their jobs are living in squalid conditions, and their passports are usually confiscated, in violation of UAE law.

4. UN Report Shows that Migration is Good for Receiving and Sending Countries
The 2009 UNDP report (United Nations Development Program) focused on migration. The report provided fresh statistics about migration practices, remittances, human development, economic growth and more. It showed that migrants from the poorest countries, on average, experienced a 15-fold increase in income, which allowed them to double school enrollment rates and a create a 16-fold reduction in child mortality back home. The report dispelled misconceptions like the harm in a “brain drain” in developing countries, or that most of the migration is to developed countries. The most important conclusion, we think, is that the report unequivocally showed that migrant labor is good for the sending country, but also for the receiving country. The myth of migrant workers coming to “steal” jobs from the locals has been debunked.

5. Wave of Suicide and Suicide Attempts by Maids in Kuwait
This story clearly shows the difference independent media has on covering abuses of migrant rights. While the wave of suicides by maids in Lebanon triggered local and global coverage, government proclamations and reports from Human Rights Watch, the unstoppable trend of suicides by migrant workers in Kuwait has resulted in meager coverage. Other than local papers, which devote short paragraphs to stories of suicides by workers, no one has taken on this cause. During November alone, we documented 13 cases of suicide or suicide attempts in Kuwait. Since that month, suicides have continued. Not a week goes by without a reports about a maid who sets herself on fire, hangs herself, drinks detergent, or workers who mysteriously fall from roofs and balconies.

What is the International convention on Rights of Migrant workers and members of their families?
The UN and other Key Organizations have always been aware of the importance and extent of the migration phenomenon, which involves millions of people and affects a large number of States in the world.

Considering this and the situation of vulnerability, in which these migrants frequently find themselves on account of their employment states in foreign countries, the international community is convinced of the need to bring about international protection of the rights of all migrant workers and their families, reaffirming and establishing basic norms in a convention which could be applied universally.

On 18th December 1990, at the United Nations, General Assembly ‘The International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all migrant workers and members of their families’ was adopted. This later entered into force on 1st July 2003

This Convention firmly establishes the rights of all those persons (including families who accompany them) who are currently engaged or will engage in employment in a country of which they are not a national (MIGRANT)

Within the framework of employment or otherwise the convention states the migrant’s and their family’s economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights.

It also looks at the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, against all migrants but in particular against women and the rights of the Children.

It clearly states the rights of migrants in abusive conditions and works towards the promotion of equality of opportunity and better treatment. It states the rights of migrants in situations of forced or compulsory labour and works towards its total abolition.

Why is Ratification of the convention Necessary?

The need for stronger protection of the rights of migrants was felt throughout the world and this was the driving forces that lead to the adoption of the Convention by the UN. Now this convention must be implemented through national ratification and legislation.

For the convention to ‘ enter into force”, twenty UN member states must ratify the convention and so far nineteen states have now acceded to the convention: Azerbaijan, Belize, Bolivia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cape Verde, Colombia, Ecuador, Egypt, Ghana, Guinea, Mexico, Morocco, Philippines, Senegal, Seychelles, Sri Lanka Tajikistan, Uganda and Uruguay.

Eleven states have signed the Convention, which is a step towards ratification: Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Chile, Comoros, Guatemala, Guinea-Bissau, Paraguay, Sao Tome & Principe, Sierra Leone, Togo and Turkey.

Governments all over the world have to be convinced that ratification of the Convention is necessary. This secures the rights of migrants on an international base.

Organisations that support this Convention and are members of the Steering Committee.

December 18

Human Rights Watch

International Catholic Migration Commission

International Trade Union Confederation

International Labour Office

International Movement Against All Forms of Discrimination and Racism

International Organization for Migration

Migrant Forum in Asia

Migrants Rights International

Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

Public Services International

UNESCO

Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom

World Council of Churches

Why do we support the Convention?

* The convention and its ratification is backed by the international community and key organizations that are working to ensure that migrants across the world have laws that protect them

* The convention will guarantee the rights of migrant workers and their families in the Middle East, which is currently lacking.

* It fights and would work towards abolishing the abusive and discriminatory conditions, under which so many of migrants and their families work in the Middle East

* The articles stated in the convention, would have to be adopted as part of the country’s national laws and practices, which means the change in the current discriminatory laws and practices. The migrants would have a system to support them in illegal or abusive employment and the state would provide them adequate and appropriate help.

* Finally, the success of the campaign is grounded in its purpose being adopted and promoted by hundreds of organizations and people who may or may not be formally affiliated to the campaign

What we need to do to strengthen the campaign?

* Create awareness about the current situation of the migrants in the Middle East.
* Create awareness about the about the International Convention on the protection of the rights of Migrants
* Collaborate with other local, regional and international groups/ units or organizations in spreading awareness on the convention.
* Build contacts with diplomats, politicians and or government employees in the region.

Read the “International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families”

If you are a…

-NGO Proprietor / Representative
-Charity Organization
-Government Representative
-Religious Representative
-Diplomat
-Lawyer
-Activist
-Reporter/Editor

Or Just Interested in the Campaign …. We would like to hear from you

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Come Join, Collaborate or Network with us and the International Community in the campaign for the protection of Migrant Rights

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Thus, the Mideast Youth team agreed to put this project together in order to help our fellow human beings, whose efforts and courage we appreciate and greatly admire, and whose rights we seriously demand.

Other than this website being a valuable, reliable, and informative network that brings together people who support this cause, we hope to give these workers the voice that they were never given in our countries.