While the economy of the UAE continues
its impressive growth, civil society
continues to stagnate and human rights
progress has been slow. Authorities have
blocked the formation of independent
human rights organizations and exerted
censorial pressure on a wide range of
social activists, impeding the kind of
vigorous monitoring and reporting that
can draw attention to and help curb
human rights abuses.
The UAE is a federation of seven
emirates: Abu Dhabi, `Ajman, Al Fujayrah,
Sharjah, Dubai, Ra’s al- Khaymah, and
Umm al-Qaywayn. The rulers of each
emirate, sitting as the Federal Supreme
Council, elect the president and vice
president from among their number. The
government announced in August 2006 that
it would hold its first-ever elections
for 20 of the 40 members of the Federal
National Council, an advisory body to
the president, in December 2006. The
emir of each emirate chooses the
candidates who can stand for election
and the president of the UAE appoints
the remaining council members.
The UAE has not signed most
international human rights and labor
rights treaties. Migrant workers,
comprising nearly 90 percent of the
workforce in the private sector, are
particularly vulnerable to serious human
rights violations.
Freedom of
Association and Expression
The government approved the formation of
the first human rights organization in
the country, the Emirates Human Rights
Association, in February 2006, but
disputes among its board members kept
the association from being fully
functional at year’s end.
The government actively discouraged the
creation of other human rights
organizations. In July 2004 a group led
by lawyer Muhammad al-Roken applied to
the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare
for permission to establish the Emirates
Human Rights Society. In April 2005
another group of 30 activists headed by
human rights campaigner Khalifa Bakhit
al-Falasi applied to the ministry to set
up another human rights association.
According to the Associations Law, the
Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare is
to reply to such requests within a month
of their filing, but as of November 2006
the ministry had not responded to either
application.
Since 2000, the government has barred 12
prominent UAE commentators and academics
from disseminating their views. In 2006
the government increased its persecution
and prosecution of human rights
defenders. In June 2006 the Federal High
Court issued an arrest warrant for
Muhammad al-Mansoori, president of the
independent Jurists Association, for
allegedly “insulting the public
prosecutor.” Security agents detained
Muhammad al-Roken, a former president of
the Jurists Association, for 24 hours in
July and again in August for three days.
On both occasions officials questioned
him about his human rights activities
and his public lectures. Security
officials confiscated his passport and
barred him from leaving the country. The
government has also not recognized City
of Hope, the country’s only shelter for
abused women, children, and domestic
workers. The organization’s director,
Sharla Musabih, currently faces
potential criminal prosecution in what
she alleges to be a politically
motivated case.
Migrant Labor
Nearly 80 percent of the UAE’s
population are foreigners, and
foreigners account for 90 percent of the
workforce in the private sector,
including domestic workers. As of May
2006, according to the Ministry of
Labor, there were 2,738,000 migrant
workers in the country. The UAE’s
economic growth has attracted large
domestic and foreign investments and the
current construction boom is one of the
largest in the world. Exploitation of
migrant construction workers by
employers, especially low-skilled
workers in small firms, is particularly
severe. Immigration sponsorship laws
that grant employers extraordinary power
over the lives of migrant workers are in
part responsible for the continuing
problem.
Abuses against migrant workers include
nonpayment of wages, extended working
hours without overtime compensation,
unsafe working environments resulting in
deaths and injuries, squalid living
conditions in labor camps, and
withholding of passports and travel
documents.
The government failed in 2006 to put in
place a minimum wage as required by the
UAE Labor Law of 1980. 2006 saw an
increasing number of public
demonstrations by migrant workers
protesting nonpayment of wages.
Twenty-five hundred construction workers
rioted in Dubai on March 21, 2006,
demanding better working conditions and
higher wages. In May 2006 thousands of
construction workers working for Besix,
a Brussels-based company, went on strike
to demand an increase in their wage of
US$4 a day and better working
conditions. The government deported 50
strikers.
In March the government announced that
it would legalize trade unions by the
end of 2006, but as of November 2006 it
had taken no steps to do so. Instead, in
September the government introduced a
law banning any migrant worker who
participates in a strike from employment
in the country for at least one year.
Following a surge in heat-related
illnesses and injuries at construction
sites in July 2005, the Labor Ministry
directed construction companies to give
their workers a break from 12:30 p.m. to
4:30 p.m. during July and August.
However, in July 2006, after intense
lobbying by construction companies, the
government reduced the afternoon break
to the hours of 12:30 p.m. to 3 p.m.
When asked about the reason for this
change, Minister of Labor Ali bin
Abdullah al-Kaabi told reporters, “The
contractors should be asked about the
reduction in the hours, as they are the
ones who have decided the timings.”
Women domestic workers are often
confined to their places of work, and
are at particular risk of abuse,
including unpaid wages, long working
hours, and physical or sexual abuse.
Trafficking
According to the US State Department,
human trafficking to the UAE is an
endemic problem. Large numbers of young
boys are annually trafficked to the UAE
to be trained as camel jockeys, and in
2005 the UAE government estimated the
number of children working as camel
jockeys to be between 1,200 and 2,700;
international organizations have put the
numbers at 5,000-6,000. Responding to
international criticism, UAE President
Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahyan
decreed in July 2005 that all camel
jockeys must be age 18 or older. The law
penalizes violators with jail terms of
up to three years and/or fines of at
least Dh50,000 (US$13,600). In 2006 the
government cooperated with UNICEF to
identify and return 1,071 children to
their home countries. The government
also provided funds for their
resettlement.
Key
International Actors
The UAE has emerged as a major business
and trading hub in the Middle East,
attracting substantial foreign
investments. The US, Japan, and the
European Union are among the UAE’s main
trading partners. In April 2004 the UAE
signed a Trade and Investment Framework
Agreement (TIFA) with the US, and the
two countries in November 2004 began
negotiations toward a Free Trade
Agreement. The UAE is also negotiating
free trade agreements with the European
Union and Australia.
In its 2006 annual report on human
trafficking, the US State Department
placed the UAE on its Tier 2 Watch List
for its “failure to show increased
efforts to combat trafficking over the
past year, particularly in its efforts
to address the large-scale trafficking
of foreign girls and women for
commercial sexual exploitation.”
In October 2004 the UAE acceded to the
Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination against Women.
However, it is not a signatory to other
major international human rights
instruments such as the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
the International Covenant on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights, the
Convention on the Protection of the
Rights of All Migrant Workers and
Members of Their Families, and the
Convention against Torture.
(Source: HRW)
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