Tricked and Trapped: Human Trafficking in the Middle East, ‎pdf 4.1 MB

‘Unfree’ recruitment: Deception about working and living conditions
The third process of trafficking for labour exploitation involves migrant
workers who are deceived about their working and/or living conditions –
including, in some cases, about their ultimate destination. Similar experiences
were recorded throughout the Middle East among migrant workers who had
been trapped in difficult situations.
The deception about working and living conditions can take different forms.
It includes the payment of different wages as was initially agreed upon,
working beyond the number of hours that are stipulated in the contract, or
having to pay for costs, such as rent or transportation, which the employer
had promised to cover. One example of such deceptive practices was recorded
in Kuwait, when an Indian worker at an electrical company stated that
“the agent in India told us we would earn 200 KWD [US$712] and that
everything would be included but we receive 160 KWD [US$570] and food
is not included.”
There are specificites also to be found, depending on the sector. Migrants
who work in agriculture are subject to harsh working conditions, facilitated
in part by the fact that the work is done in remote rural areas, away from
public scrutiny. In Lebanon, the agricultural industry is an important but
underprivileged sector in the country. 226 The industry faces a multitude of
problems, including the lack of fertile land, inadequate investment and
mishandling of property by owners. The agricultural workforce is composed
of Palestinians (mainly working in the south of the country), Syrians (in
the Beqaa), Bedouins and Lebanese. These workers are very poor, and so
accept seasonal work with no contracts; they are often deceived about their
working conditions, including their exposure to occupational safety and
health hazards, such as working with pesticides. The situation of agricultural
workers has been better documented in Jordan, which relies extensively on
Egyptian migrant workers, currently estimated to be 87,000 strong. 227 The
NGO Tamkeen reported that migrant workers’ rights are severely neglected
in Jordan. Many of them work long hours, are not allowed the weekly day
off to which they are entitled and have no annual leave; their passports are
taken from them, their wages are withheld, and they are subjected to verbal
and physical abuse. 228
226
Interview with an official from the General Confederation of Lebanese Workers,
Lebanon, 27 Sep. 2012.
227
Tamkeen: Between a rock and a hard place, p. 49; Phenix Center for Economic
and Informatics Studies: Agricultural Workers: Absence of Basic Rights and Suspicion of
“Human-Trafficking”(Amman, 2010).
228
Ibid., p. 56.
107