Exactly Why Did Bush Support Dubai's Involvement In Our Ports?

Throughout the scandal over the DPW ports deal, President Bush decried the backlash against the deal and argued that Dubai was an important partner in the fight against terrorism, for human rights and in trade.

Having been over in that part of the world (Persian/Arabian Gulf), I have seen how things really are... and almost all of the Arab Gulf States involve themselves in unfair labor practices, including many situations where foreign workers from the Philippines, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and elsewhere are treated with disdain, physical and verbal abuse, withholding of wages, lockouts and, in a lot of cases, sexual abuse, rape and assault. This is reported in Bahrain (the most liberal Gulf State), Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, the UAE and Yemen.

The article below reports on some of these problems. In my view it represents yet another reason why we cannot place our national security under the control of foreign corporations, especially those wholly-owned by a foreign power that has this sort of reputation.

In Dubai, An Outcry From Asians For Workplace Rights

Dubai's gleaming high rises, idyllic beaches and seemingly limitless opportunities glittered on the pages of brochures and in the stories told by laborers returning home to his native Kerala, India. But after five years here, surviving in squalid conditions and barely making ends meet on less than $200 a month, Mr. Kumaran, 28, says his dream has long since faded.

"I thought this was the land of opportunity, but I was fooled," he said Thursday, as he stood with several other construction workers outside their work camp in the desert on the outskirts of the city.

When hundreds of workers angered by low salaries and mistreatment rioted Tuesday night at the site of what is to become the world's tallest skyscraper, not only were they expressing the growing frustration of Asian migrants here, they offered a glimpse of an increasingly organized labor force.

Far from the high-rise towers and luxury hotels emblematic of Dubai, the workers turning this swath of desert into a modern metropolis live in a Dickensian world of cramped labor camps, low pay and increasing desperation.

For years, workers like Mr. Kumaran have done whatever they could to get here, often paying thousands of dollars to unscrupulous recruiters for the chance to work at one of the hundreds of construction sites in the emirates.

Of the 1.5 million residents of Dubai, as many as a million are immigrants who have come here to work in some capacity, with the largest subgroup being construction workers, said Hadi Ghaemi, a researcher with Human Rights Watch who covers the United Arab Emirates, citing government statistics. A vast majority of the immigrants come from the Indian subcontinent and the Philippines.

With the cost of living rising, many have abandoned dreams of returning with a fortune. The construction workers' camps, in particular, have been set up ever deeper in the desert. That adds an hour or two just to get to the job site every morning, in addition to the workers' 12-hour shifts.

A growing number have resorted to suicide rather than return home with empty pockets: last year, 84 South Asians committed suicide in Dubai, according to the Indian Consulate here, up from 70 in 2004.

Mr. Kumaran, who earns 550 dirhams every month, or about $150, as a laborer, sends home almost half his earnings and lives on the equivalent of roughly $60 a month. That is barely enough to pay for food and cigarettes and using his cellphone from time to time. But he is not sure how he will repay the loan he took to get here.

"If I'd stayed in India and worked just as hard as I do now, I could have made the same money," he said. "And I wouldn't have needed to get a loan to come here."

Since last September, when 800 workers staged a protest march down a main highway in the heart of the city and set off a national debate about the treatment of foreign workers, laborers have held at least eight major strikes to demand their rights and get their pay, which is sometimes withheld.

In fact, my own experience in Bahrain is similar to those reported in this article. My employer, a wealthy woman from a powerful family with close ties to the Al-Khalifa royal family, decided to breach the contract we signed, withheld my wages, and locked me out of my living quarters. Fortunately, being an American citizen, I had the help of the US Embassy staff, as well as some friends working at the international airport, and some students that were members of the royal family that put me in touch with the Amir, who funded my flight back home. Westerners fare better than Asians in terms of labor disputes and incidents because of the diplomatic power of those counties. But Asians, with the exception of perhaps Japanese citizens, are prime victims for these types of abuse.