Comments on: Saudi Arabia: Slavery in the Gulf

By: rahim

rahim — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 05:09:35 +0000

UN should kick saudis out of the NY building…they dont deserve to be there…saudis think exploiting muslim ppl will make them rich…well i think wen they will fall in trouble Bangladeshi ppl will think 100 times b4 sending help for them….and wen those oil will be gone…i suggest saudis to eat desert sands…

By: Ben

Ben — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 05:00:32 +0000

Most ppl here in Bangladesh consider Arab land as holy land,but when ppl go up there to get some living, they find the real truth.Saudians employ female worker only to get sexual benefit.
EXAMPLE………If a female worker wants to go to saudi it will cost her half of the cost for male worker.
so u know y it is unequal..as far as i know saudians dont consider ppl from sub continent equal as them.
I fully support what bangladeshi poor workers did..
But nothing actually changed..

By: Habib

Habib — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 10:29:04 +0000

As a Bangladeshi I have a very very bad impression about the Arab people as a whole.The reason is obvious(your article is well enough to justify that)

But now I know still there are some voices/hopes there to say or think what is right and what is wrong.

By: Ahmed Baaboud

Ahmed Baaboud — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 23:29:26 +0000

Poly Zesus,

I am a Saudi citizen who come from Yemeni background. My father came to Saudi Arabia more than 40 years ago and I was born in Saudi. I still have relatives who live in Yemen and others who live in Saudi and do not have the Saudi citizenship. I hope this clarifies the misunderstanding.

By: Poly Zesus

Poly Zesus — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 19:28:31 +0000

first you were talking about the foreign labor in Saudi ,then you mentioned that you know that because your relatives work in some fabric shops”because I have relatives working as salespeople in shops selling fabric and watches” so your relatives are Yemenis !! right , are you sure that this blogger is really Saudi ? cuz it doesn’t make sense

By: Global Voices Online » Lebanon: Maid is Lebanese for Slave

Global Voices Online » Lebanon: Maid is Lebanese for Slave — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 14:04:51 +0000

[...] There and regional bloggers are publishing alarming reports about the abuse of foreign maids in the region and lately in Lebanon, where reportedly 200,000 maids are legally employed. And with the absence of [...]

By: …My heart’s in Accra » Bridges to Saudi Arabia

…My heart’s in Accra » Bridges to Saudi Arabia — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 16:57:00 +0000

[...] can’t go, you can always read. Reading the Global Voices Digest this morning, I came across Ayesha Saldanha’s translations from Saudi blogs about slavery and worker’s rights in Gul…. The frustration and anger in these posts at the treatment of “guest workers” makes it [...]

By: CelticIberian Centurion

CelticIberian Centurion — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 00:15:09 +0000

A very famous international political figure of the 20th Century, once referred to Saudi Arabia as an “Antediluvian Monarchy”. Sort of what King Nimrod was doing with folks in his domain before the flood; enslaving them and literally hunting down men. I was stationed in the Gulf during the eighties, and although my frame of reference might be outdated, I don’t think things have changed much in “The Kingdom”. I wonder if ARAMCO still operates over there, a neo-colonial monopoly, partly owned outside the country. And what about those housing compounds surrounded by solid concrete high walls, where the American expatriates lived? And do American workers still are grandfathered into the Saudi social security system after being there for 10 years, like it used to be? If that wasn’t colonialism I don’t know what it was. Bahrain was a bit better, since the Saudis would cross the causeway to go get drunk in the hotels, and make gay approaches to the American G.I.s and get into trouble with hotel security. The list goes on. The Gulf States is the contemporary version of the “domino theory” about Southeast Asia, during the Vietnam War, except that these corrupt regimes might actually fall one after the other, once a real crisis starts in the Gulf, which is only a matter of time. The governments have no real legitimacy, and there is no real consent of the governed over there. It takes more than just being a “U.S. ally” to be able to survive the fires of history…….

By: Chris Hooymans

Chris Hooymans — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 22:05:58 +0000

Well, they should all go on strike for a month, let those Kuwait slavedrivers get their own baby soft hands dirty for a change – It won’t take long before the wages offered will go up – they have the money -have you noticed the price of oil lately? – It’s OK to say no to a bad deal.

By: Samir

Samir — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 20:30:35 +0000

The laborer slave trade to the gulf states is not new, it has been going on for a long time. Refer CNN world report 1999 to the rampant sexual abuse of female maids hired into gulf states households “imported” from muslim population of the indian subcontinent, thailand, phillipines and indonesia. Sorry state of affairs indeed.