From: adam@endor.uucp (Adam Shostack)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.mideast
Subject: Re: How Much Did The U.S. Get?
Date: 14 Sep 92 03:03:20 GMT
Organization: Aiken Computation Lab, Harvard University

In article <1992Sep13.204013.1@utxvms.cc.utexas.edu> bgdv706@utxvms.cc.utexas.edu (Noam Tractinsky) writes:
>In article <1992Sep10.085110.4534@mcs.kent.edu>, rayes@Snake.mcs.kent.edu (Sandra Rayes) writes:

>> Ha!  I heard, from a Kuwaiti woman mind you, that the young ladies
>> of Kuwait live in fear that the Emir might spot them sometime and
>> demand to marry them...then divorce them the following week.  It
>> seems mut'ah is a fashion with our Emir...

>	Can someone corroborate this horror story?

Not this exact sotory, but this was posted a while back, by Jake.  It
has to do with the status of women in Kuwait:

Date: 23 Jan 92 23:03:05 GMT

In article <2197@copper.Denver.Colorado.EDU> aaldoubo@copper.denver.colorado.edu (Anisa Alnoor Aldoubosh) writes:

>>In Muslim societies, women are valued and protected (unlike here), and we are
>>not faced with issues like homelessness, rape, molestation and incest.  




An interesting, if horrifying, article appeared in the Jan. 3, 1992 New York
Times entitled "Foreign Women Lured Into Bondage in Kuwait".  This article
describes the abuse and rape in Kuwait of women from Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, 
India and the Phillipines.  Excerpts from the half-page article follow:

"Edita Castro left her home in a Manila slum for Kuwait after hearing 
a radio commercial promising a good job overseas.  [...]  But when she 
showed up at the airport she was spirited away in a van to a house in 
Kuwait City [for work she hadn't agreed to.]

"Many Kuwaitis, who felt the sting of mistreatment by their Iraqui occupiers,
have failed to translate that experience into compassion for the 500,000
menial laborers, most of them from Asia, who do everything from sweep 
their streets to cook their food.

"Beaten and Raped"

"Once in her employer's home, Mrs. Castro was refused permission to leave 
for even a few minutes.  She could not receive letters or phone calls, even
from her family.  Her work began before dawn and ended long after midnight.

"If she failed to respond fast enough, she was beaten.  She was never paid 
her $130 a month salary.  Then, she recounts, she was raped by her employer.

[Castro flees to the Phillipine embassy, where another 130 women have 
sought refuge.  Other embassies hold more such refugees.]

"The Indian, Bangladesh and Sri Lankan embassies say 15 to 20 women a day 
arrive at their gates with similar stories of abuse.

[...]

"Mir Abdel Hossain, First Secretary of the Bangladesh Embassy, said 'This 
job of houseboy or a maid in Kuwait is almost like slavery.'"  

[...]

"The Kuwaiti government will not issue exit visas to the workers without 
the employers' consent, even if they can get emergency travel documents 
from their embassies."

"Abuse of foreign workers is nothing new in the emirate, which has one of 
the highest standards of living in the world.  In 1988, the Phillipine 
government banned agencies from recruiting maids for Kuwait, contending 
that many were abused.  The Sri Lankan, Bangladesh and Indian Governments 
also discourage women from taking jobs in the Persian Gulf countries and 
especially Kuwait."

[...]

"The agencies skirt the Phillipine ban by promising employment in Bahrain 
or Qatar and sending the women on to Kuwait instead.

[...]

"The pressure on those trapped inside the embassies is intense.  They are 
unable to support their families back home, who depend on the income from
abroad to survive.  The women have no privacy and little to occupy their 
time.

"Maid's Return Demanded

"Col. Abdel Latif, whose maid, Lourma Sanchez, has taken refuge in the 
Phillipine Embassy, angrily demanded her return from embassy employees.

"The maid, who contends she was frequently beaten, said the colonel
followed and struck her with his car as she tried to flee from the 
house.  The colonel says 'she had an accident trying to escape.'"

[Sanchez then tried to commit suicide in the embassy.]

"The colonel, when told of the incident, refused to back down.

"'Do you think that I run a travel agency for Fillipino girls?'
he asked?  'What about my money?  Who is going to pay my money back?'"
---
Jake Livni

---

Adam Shostack 					adam@das.harvard.edu

What a terrible thing to have lost one's .sig.  Or not to have a .sig
at all.  How true that is.