$8,927,000 to go

As far as I can find out from news reports on the subject, the first compensation to child camel jockeys repatriated to their home countries from the U.A.E. has just been finalised.

73 cases have received approval from the U.A.E. Interior Ministry to receive $1000 each. The money, called a "rehabilitation fund", will be put into a Punjab Bank trust account. The Rs600 ($15) interest per month will be sent to the parents with the proviso that their child (the former child jockey) is "regularly" sent to school.

Back in 2006, a BBC report stated that the U.A.E. government would give $9,000,000 to approx. 1,000 former child jockeys who had been repatriated to Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sudan and Mauritania. Working in co-operation with UNICEF, the money would "ensure they receive the salaries owed to them and compensation for losing their income. It will also go towards education."

By my calculations, that means that each child should receive approx. $9000. There appears to be an anomaly between what was promised and what's been delivered.

More info sites, although I can't vouch that all of them can be accessed by everyone in the U.A.E.:
~ Commission on Human Rights Report on Anti-Slavery.org
~ "UAE: Talks on compensation for child camel jockeys" (held at Emirates Towers in June 2007) on Child Rights Information Network.com
~ Dubai Government's Dubaicameljockeys.org website
~ Camel jockeys return home on UNICEF.org

What's UNICEF's role in this? The organisation seems to have played no part in the recent allocation of the funds, nor in the June 2007 meeting as the report states:
Each Board may designate one or more NGOs or similar entities like UNICEF or the Red Crescent Society, chosen for their expertise in working with children formerly involved in camel racing. These NGOs/entities will help publicise the Claim Facility and provide legal and other assistance to children who are considering or have filed claims.

It appears that UNICEF has been removed from the insider loop - although, if not legally, then morally and ethically they must uphold their side of the agreement between them and the U.A.E. to ensure that the children are properly cared for and that the promises of adequate compensation and education are being upheld.

Also, in a brilliant piece of deduction, Dubai Police has stated that there is no organised trafficking in human beings in the U.A.E. because "no U.A.E. National has been involved in any kind of human trafficking case till date."

According to Major General Khamis Matar Al Mazina, deputy commander general of Dubai Police, this "proves that our country is free from such illegal practice."

Others would say otherwise, and if this lawsuit is ever brought to trial and the defendants proven guilty, the muppets in Dubai Police may have to rethink their beliefs.

As Dubai Millionaires Multiply...

money masks missing liberties

"I couldn't have done a 10th of what I've done if it hadn't been for Dubai,'' says Naqvi, 47, who moved to Dubai in 1994 with $50,000 of savings and now runs buyout firm Abraaj Capital Ltd. His $5 billion of assets include stakes in Turkish hospitals, Saudi Arabian pharmacies and a Jordanian aircraft repair company. Successful investments include Dubai's Arabtec Holdings PJSC, which is building the world's tallest skyscraper, Burj Dubai, on a $20 billion construction site not far from Naqvi's office.
In a ditch near the Giorgio Armani-designed hotel on the tower's lower floors, construction worker Omkar Singh leans on a shovel and wipes sweat from his brow. Singh, 24, went into debt to pay 60,000 rupees ($1,500) -- more than six months of earnings, including overtime -- to an agent to get to Dubai from India. The agent promised eight-hour workdays. Singh says he works at least 10-hour shifts, six days a week. "I was taken for a ride,'' he says.

this is by far one of the most comprehensive and balanced pieces done on dubai. talking about human rights, the piece adds:

Sheikh Mohammed declined to comment for this story through Mona al-Marri, a spokeswoman at Dubai-based public relations firm Jiwin.

it goes on to say:

French-born Denis Ravizza says he's so comfortable in Dubai he doesn't worry about any loss of political freedom. "I don't care about living in a place where I don't vote and I don't decide,'' says Ravizza, 44, the associate dean of Dubai's French Fashion University. "What they decide for the country is good for me.''
Others say that freedom matters. "If we are talking about making Dubai the finest city in the world, it needs to be more transparent,'' says Maitri Somaia, 20, an Indian media and communications student. "I definitely don't feel oppressed, but whatever I say, I frame my sentences very carefully. I have to.''

Everyone who ever set foot on arabland, knew the ways of the government. those in power were not voted in, they inherited it. when we stepped on these sands, we also gave up the right to express our opinions in the way we knew back home. and the trade-off was made in return for security, a better quality of life, and yes, monetary benefits. why then, do we come to foreign lands and demand the luxuries we grew up with? why did we willingly give them up, if they were so important to us to begin with?

Your Child Is My Child, Let’s Protect His Future Now!

Justice Without Frontiers, the coordinator of the Lebanese Coalition for the ICC, has launched a campaign, entitled, “Your Child Is My Child, Let’s Protect His Future Now,” dedicated to the Lebanese people, and particularly to the Lebanese children, who have been devastated, disfigured, burned, and killed by Israeli weapons.

Justice Without Frontiers invites and urges all national, regional and international NGOs, to participate and support this campaign and support Lebanon’s accession to the Rome statute for the ICC by signing a petition and forwarding it to others.

Shocking Saudis!

Agence France Presse:

An advertising agency in Saudi Arabia plans to air public service commercials to promote kinder treatment of domestic helpers in a country where reports of abuse of foreign workers abound. The ads will air on Arab satellite television stations after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, expected to end on October 12, said Kaswara al-Khatib, founder and chief creative director of Full Stop Advertising.

[...] "We deal with helpers as if they are not humans and have no feelings," (quote from Kaswara al-Khatib, founder and chief creative director of Full Stop Advertising).

[...] Reports of exploitation ranging from the withholding of salaries and passports to physical assault and sexual abuse are increasingly appearing in the local press.

New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) charged in August that the beating to death of two Indonesian female workers by a Saudi family highlighted the "atmosphere of impunity fostered by government inaction" toward abusive employers.

In July 2004, HRW was accused by Riyadh of exaggerating the incidence of foreign labor abuse in Saudi Arabia after it released a report alleging that foreign workers were systematically exploited, some of them living in slave-like conditions.

Riyadh police teamed up with the Sri Lankan Embassy in September to rescue a Sri Lankan maid who had telephoned the Arab News newspaper to say she had been imprisoned, abused and unpaid by her woman employer for at least seven years. [...]

__________________________________

I find it shocking and revolting that such practices happen in Saudi. Islam is not about covering your hair and acting prude or not speaking to ghair-mahram men while you starve your domestic help at home, it starts with treating your fellow human being with dignity, respect and mercy, especially when you are in a position of power over them!.

Indeed, as the ad campaign features, "He who has no mercy will not receive mercy,"(Hadeeth quote) Certainly in this case that's how it should be!

FIFTY THREE DEGREES!!

This is from my car display this afternoon...I wonder if the laborers on the gazillion construction sites were working in this heat!!

Isn’t there some sort of law stating that outdoor workers get the day off if the temperature hits above fifty degrees or something like that???

There's gotta be SOME law? It's impossible to work like that! And with the humidity too...!!!

A Dearth of Politics in Booming Dubai

Courtesy of an anonymous commenter...

"Mohammed al-Roken, a leading human rights activist in Dubai, has been arrested twice, forced out of his job as a professor and barred from traveling abroad. (By Anthony Shadid -- The Washington Post)

"There is hardly anybody in the city who doesn't feel a bit of fear inside him, a fear of losing it all at a time when we have it all," he said. "Do you call it alienation? It's much beyond that. We live in the best of times and, in some ways, the worst of times."

For Roken, the challenge of alienation is an unusual one. He wants to embolden citizens -- a distinct minority -- to raise their voices against an authoritarian government he says caters to expatriates, the majority. The government provides Emiratis with generous housing loans, pays for schooling and ensures free health care. But Roken is more unsettled by the intangibles: entering a mall where virtually everyone is a foreigner, beaches populated by swimmers in dress he considers immodest, and wine-tasting parties at luxury hotels. Only a more democratic polity, albeit entrusted to a minority, can stanch what he sees as Dubai's more flagrant excesses."

Read more of the article here (to read the first page you must register with the site)

OF GREEDY APPETITES AND GLASS HOUSES

This past week, on a girl's night out, was greatly disturbed to meet the young wife of a prominent construction industry bigwig. At first the estrogen-speak induced recurring ignorance and plastic plutocracy much like that of the nouveau riche had me shrink away in disgust, but soon realized she was just getting started when she announced that in an American-Airlines-one-olive-at-a-time cost-cutting fashion, her husband tactfully introduced a clause on the labor force's contract allowing the company to deduct AED 75 from the worker's wage should said worker fail to report for duty and AED 45 in case of a fight. Only in this case, not one but two olives will be plucked from under boy blue (quite literally) considering his already non-existent pay. "According to our estimate, on account of the fights alone we should be able to save thousands on book by the end of the year", says she.

Exactly what makes them steal food off a poor man's table when they have want for nothing?

Post came off my blog but what I'm feeling, only public venting could cure; albeit partially.

State lawmaker questions UConn's Dubai plan

I hadn't heard that the University of Connecticut was planning on opening a Dubai campus, but this plan isn't getting a warm reception from Rep. Andrew M. Fleischmann, the co-chair of the state General Assembly's Education Committee:

"[I]t's always important to understand whom you are partnering with...

"There are major questions that have been raised about human rights in Dubai... [A] critical first step would be for Dubai and the rest of the United Arab Emirates to agree to start living by certain basic standards of human rights and worker rights that appear to be neglected there now.

"There are people living in Dubai right now ... who are, functionally, little more than indentured servants."

The story also sites the Human Rights Watch report from last December.