Kuwait Violates Human Rights of Foreign Workers

Kuwait Violates Human Rights of Its Slave Laborers

Kuwaiti Officials Beat and Torture Foreign Workers

By Mezba, Global Voices

Most of the Muslim Student Associations in universities in North America have a very vocal content about supporting Palestine issues. Many of them also have a strong pro-Arab camp, where they harp on supporting the Arab countries against Israel on many issues, and whenever Arabs are mistreated or discriminated against, it is painted as an "Islamic" issue. Many converts to Islam here also have an idolized view of the Arab lands.

Having lived in the Middle East before, I have a different view on these issues. Here's something I caught on the news recently.

Some time ago Bangladeshi workers in Kuwait went on strike because they had not been paid by the Kuwaiti authorities for more than 3 months. These are already dirt poor people doing menial jobs saving whatever scraps they can to help their families back in Bangladesh. So what did the Kuwaitis do?

They beat up the striking workers, locked many of them up and deported them all to Bangladesh. There were also tales of torture when those deported people reached Bangladesh.

Today, I found a letter in Kuwait Times where one resident writes "Bangladeshi cleaners, Thank you."

I would to thank all the Bangladeshi cleaners who used to collect the garbage from sunset until sunrise, to clean up the dirt and the leftovers of mine and of all residents of Kuwait. They were, in fact, doing a great job and excellent work.
.
.
.
While we enjoyed the luxury of new, clean clothes every day, the dirty, yellow dirty uniform was the costume that they lived, ate and maybe even slept in.
.
.
.
Salaries: Why do you work? This is not a new topic, it's an old one and a natural request. Why do any of us go to work and how many of us would work for free?

Meanwhile, now Kuwait, probably hit by the garbage on the streets, have admitted responsibility (where have we heard this before?).

I have said it before and I have said it again, the problem lies in governments of countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka making no attempt to ban their citizens from working in slavery-conditions in these countries. Blind by the lure of foreign currency and cash these workers bring, they have trampled on their welfare and rights.

Next time an Arab supporting MSA comes around to ask me for support against Israeli oppression against Palestinians, I am going to ask, "how are you any better".

Posted by mezba at 8:18 PM

Homeland Security Batters Immigrant Workers

Homeland Security Batters Immigrant Workers
Joshua Holland, Alternet

Last week, hundreds of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, flanked by helicopters, a trail of SUVs and a convoy of buses, descended on the tiny town of Postville, Iowa. They set up a perimeter around the 60-acre kosher meat-processing plant operated by the global giant Agriprocessors, Inc. and conducted the largest workplace raid in U.S. history. Around 400 people were arrested -- most from Mexico, Eastern Europe and Guatemala -- representing 40 percent of the plant's workers and 17 percent of the town's population. Warrants for another 300 were issued.
Some would call it a victory for law and order. But a closer look at the showy example of "getting tough on illegals" offers some insight into what immigration restrictionists are really asking for when they call for more immigration enforcement.
During a similar sweep last year, ICE generated some bad publicity when reporters found that a number of young children had been left unattended when their parents were arrested. So 56 of those arrested last week -- mostly mothers of small kids -- were released on "humanitarian grounds." Nonetheless, a federal lawsuit filed on behalf of dozens of the Postville detainees "noted that a number of immigrant workers' children have been stranded with baby sitters and other caretakers as a result of the raid."
The suit charges that some of the detained workers are victims of crimes by Agriprocessors, Inc., which may entitle them to a visa, and accuses the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) of arbitrary and indefinite detention and violating the workers' constitutional rights.
According to the Associated Press, an attorney who interviewed some of those swept up in the raid said that the company itself "obtained false identification for immigrant workers." But in the overwhelming majority of these raids -- 98 percent, according to the Washington Post -- the only people to pay any penalty are poor people trying to earn a substandard wage working in America's growing unregulated economy.
Meanwhile, ICE charged many of the detained with "identity theft" for those faked papers, effectively giving immigration hard-liners what Congress hasn't granted them through the legislative process: serious criminal charges for what have always been misdemeanor immigration violations at most.
In this case, as in many others like it, many of the workers appear to have been seriously exploited. The AP reported that the plant's management "improperly withheld money from employees' paychecks for 'immigration fees,' didn't allow workers to use the restroom during 10-hour shifts, physically abused workers and didn't compensate them for overtime work."
According to MSNBC, workers at the plant were routinely started at $5 per hour for their first three or four months on the job and then raised to $6, still well below Iowa's minimum wage of $7.25.
Iowa Labor Commissioner David Neil confirmed to the Des Moines Register that Agriprocessors was being investigated by the state on suspicion of wage violations, paying people off the books and hiring underage workers. A copy of the federal warrant obtained by the Register described an incident in which "a supervisor covered the eyes of an employee with duct tape and struck him with a meat hook."
It's unclear what the raids' impact will be on the ongoing investigations into the company's workplace violations. With hundreds of workers -- and potential witnesses -- carted away, Jill Cashen, a spokesperson for the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), asked: "how can justice ever be served on these exploitation issues?"
Agriprocessor's management must have been pleased with the timing of the raid. Not only did it put at least a crimp in the ongoing investigations of serious allegations of abuse by the company, it also derailed an effort by UFCW to organize the plants' workers and give them a shot at bargaining with management for better working conditions.