Kamal swats away a swarm of black desert flies from his face as he pours coffee from a battered tin pot. His calloused hands are shaking as he looks furtively at his "watchman" standing outside in the courtyard.
"If we are caught speaking to you here, we are finished, you understand that? They will throw me in prison and deport everyone in this camp, not just the people in this room. They are actively looking for us," he tells me.
The construction workers, packed together inside the tiny hut in one of Dubai's harsh desert labor camps, are breaking the most fundamental of all the draconian laws governing immigrants within the United Arab Emirates (UAE) -- they are holding a union meeting, a practice that is banned in all but one of the Gulf States. They are also plotting their next move in protest at their treatment by their Arab employers who, they claim, exploit them for cheap labor. It's a move that will, for the first time, involve direct confrontation with the millions of tourists who visit the city every year. They plan to shame foreigners into taking notice of their plight.
PHOTO: AFP
Dubai, one of the country's seven emirates and uniquely poor in oil, is at the pinnacle of a decade-long building boom that has transformed the city into one of the world's most popular tourist destinations. Today it is the largest construction site in the Middle East, home to luxurious hotels and three of the largest shopping malls on the planet.
The city's unrivalled building frenzy may be creating one of the Middle East's most modern and alluring holiday destinations, but it is supported by an increasingly disgruntled foreign labor force whose basic human right -- the right to voice their opinion -- is denied.
"One of the world's largest construction booms is feeding off impoverished immigrant workers in Dubai, but they're treated as less than human," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.
A recent report by the group painted a deeply disturbing picture of immigrant lives in the UAE. It claimed that bleak living conditions, combined with long working hours and unacceptably low pay, had led to rising suicide rates among foreign workers in Dubai.
Last year, 80 Indian residents took their lives, up from 67 in 2004. In addition, an estimated 880 foreign workers died in accidents on UAE construction sites.
In recent months, though, the UAE's vast population of foreign workers have begun to fight back.
They have already staged sporadic strikes to protest at low pay. Women brought in to work as domestic servants are running away in record numbers.
A fortnight ago, in the biggest outbreak of public dissent in the UAE's history, thousands of workers rioted at the construction site for the Burj Dubai Tower, which by 2008 will become the world's tallest building.
Angered by withheld payments and mistreatment by their employers, some 2,500 laborers turned on their bosses and the local police, smashing cars and offices on the site and causing an estimated $1m of damage.
In a sympathy strike a day later, thousands of laborers working at Dubai International Airport laid down their tools.
According to 36-year-old Kamal (not his real name), who spearheaded the Burj Dubai protest, more needs to be done.
"These protests received attention in the press and were forgotten about, we need to do more. I was involved in a sit-down protest on the motorway last month, but the police came along with sticks and beat us on the backs and head. Many of my friends were hospitalized and deported," he said.
"The riot got a lot of attention, but things haven't improved for us. We already know what we have to do next, we take our protests into the malls and to the beaches," Kamal said.
"Our situation needs international attention and only by unsettling tourists can we achieve this. They need to see how desperate we really are," he said.
Trinidad and Tobago declared a new state of emergency on Friday after authorities accused a criminal network operating in prisons across the country of plotting to kill key government officials and attack public institutions. It is the second state of emergency to be declared in the twin-island republic in a matter of months. In December last year, authorities took similar action, citing concerns about gang violence. That state of emergency lasted until mid-April. Police said that smuggled cellphones enabled those involved in the plot to exchange encrypted messages. Months of intelligence gathering led investigators to believe the targets included senior police officers,
A disillusioned Japanese electorate feeling the economic pinch goes to the polls today, as a right-wing party promoting a “Japanese first” agenda gains popularity, with fears over foreigners becoming a major election issue. Birthed on YouTube during the COVID-19 pandemic, spreading conspiracy theories about vaccinations and a cabal of global elites, the Sanseito Party has widened its appeal ahead of today’s upper house vote — railing against immigration and dragging rhetoric that was once confined to Japan’s political fringes into the mainstream. Polls show the party might only secure 10 to 15 of the 125 seats up for grabs, but it is
FOREST SITE: A rescue helicopter spotted the burning fuselage of the plane in a forested area, with rescue personnel saying they saw no evidence of survivors A passenger plane carrying nearly 50 people crashed yesterday in a remote spot in Russia’s far eastern region of Amur, with no immediate signs of survivors, authorities said. The aircraft, a twin-propeller Antonov-24 operated by Angara Airlines, was headed to the town of Tynda from the city of Blagoveshchensk when it disappeared from radar at about 1pm. A rescue helicopter later spotted the burning fuselage of the plane on a forested mountain slope about 16km from Tynda. Videos published by Russian investigators showed what appeared to be columns of smoke billowing from the wreckage of the plane in a dense, forested area. Rescuers in
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr is to meet US President Donald Trump this week, hoping Manila’s status as a key Asian ally would secure a more favorable trade deal before the deadline on Friday next week. Marcos would be the first Southeast Asian leader to meet Trump in his second term. Trump has already struck trade deals with two of Manila’s regional partners, Vietnam and Indonesia, driving tough bargains in trade talks even with close allies that Washington needs to keep onside in its strategic rivalry with China. “I expect our discussions to focus on security and defense, of course, but also
RSS