Over the months of August and September, migrant workers in Kuwait continued to commit suicide at an alarming rate. Over this two-months period, 27 migrant workers have attempted to end their life or succeeded in doing so. This is an increase from 23 suicides and suicide attempts in the two months p…
Archive for the ‘Housemaids’ Category
Almost every two days a migrant worker commits suicide in Kuwait
October 5th, 2010
The Sponsorship System and Domestic Labor in Saudi Arabia
September 22nd, 2010
Gulf Housemaids Racism Saudi Arabia Sponsorship Trafficking
Kafala Politics and Domestic Labor in Saudi Arabia by R. B. As we prepare to land at Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport, I grudgingly wear my abaya and wrap the headscarf around my neck. A few Saudi men in jeans and t-shirts rush to the bathrooms and change into their long, white thobes. W...
Saudi Sponsors Suspected of Brutally Murdering Two Asian Maids
September 16th, 2010
Abusive employers Housemaids Legal cases Saudi Arabia
Last week, two murder cases of Asian domestic workers were reported in Saudi Arabia. In the first case, a Saudi employer confessed in a Medina court to murdering her Indonesian maid, after medical reports showed that she was beaten to death. In the second case, a Filipino maid was brutally murdered ...
Assistance request: Kenyan family seeking to find the body of dead relative in Lebanon
September 15th, 2010
On September 1, 2010, Ethiopian Suicides blog posted that a Kenyan migrant worker was found dead after falling from the sixth floor while trying to escape her employer’s house. The Kenyan migrant was not named. On September 8, a comment was published under the post which said “One of our...
Lebanon: Malagasy migrant domestic worker falls from fifth floor, dies
September 7th, 2010
Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar reported today the death of Malagasy migrant worker, Doris Jajitia (25 years old), last Thursday, after falling from the fifth floor balcony of her employer in Mtayleb (North of Beirut). Police reports have concluded that it’s a suicide, in less than 24 hours, acco...
Saudi Maid Verdict ‘Outrageous’: HRW
August 28th, 2010
Abusive employers Housemaids Legal cases Saudi Arabia
Human Rights Watch has called on a Saudi court to reverse a decision to drop charges against a couple who severely beat their Indonesian maid. The judge awarded a mere $670 compensation to Nour Miyati, who was tied up by her employers and left in a cellar for a month in 2005. The 25 year old woman ...
Sri Lankan maid tortured by Saudi sponsors
August 25th, 2010
Abusive employers Housemaids Saudi Arabia
The Arab Times reported today about a horrific case of abuse of a Sri Lankan maid by her sponsors in Saudi Arabia. The maid, who returned to Sri Lanka and was hospitalized had 23 nails removed from her body as a testament to the severe abuse she suffered. The 50-year-old maid, Ariyawathie, reported ...
Lebanon: Increase in death of migrant domestic workers
August 25th, 2010
In the past few days, Al-Akhbar newspaper reported, based on police reports, the probable suicide, the death or the injury of several migrant domestic workers. The following is the resume: On Saturday 21 August, at 2 p.m. a Bengali maid drowned and died in the swimming pool in the villa of her emplo...
Photographer Exposes the Unseen Lives of Migrant Domestic Workers in Lebanon
August 21st, 2010
Abusive employers Documentation Housemaids Interviews Lebanon Working conditions
Below is an interview with Matthew Cassel, an American photographer and journalist based in Lebanon about his photography project Unseen Lives: Migrant Domestic Workers in Lebanon (see slideshow at the bottom of this post). In the interview Matthew describes how he was able to get close to the migra...
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