Number of abused workers in KSA small
Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen downplayed the deaths and exploitation of Bangladeshi female migrant workers in Saudi Arabia, claiming the number of such victims was “small”.
“There are some 2.5 lakh to 3 lakh women [working in KSA]. How many of them have died?” he asked journalists who raised the issue of women domestic workers facing physical, mental and sexual abuses in the Kingdom.
A research by Ovibashi Karmi Unnayan Program on 110 abused female migrant returnees from the KSA found that 61 percent were physically abused, 14 percent were sexually abused, 86 percent did not receive their full salaries and 24 percent were deprived of food.
Brac Migration Program recorded the returns of 1,300 female migrants from Saudi Arabia in 2018 and 900 so far in 2019 after facing abuses.
According to Brac estimates, the actual number is to be much higher.
Besides, the corpses of 48 female migrants were repatriated from Saudi Arabia in first nine months this year. Of those, 20 were suicides, according to the migration programme.
There were also reports of women who were raped and impregnated in the Arab kingdom, where domestic workers are not recognised by the law.
Journalists asked the minister if the Bangladesh government had challenged any Saudi employer who was accused of raping or other forms of exploitation.
“How do you say that we haven’t challenged? Whenever there is an accident, we instantly inform the Saudi government… should I tell this to the public that I have challenged [them]?” Abdul Momen asked at his foreign ministry office yesterday.
He said there were some 1.22 crore Bangladeshis working worldwide and many of them die. “Death can even happen at home. What’s the percentage of migrants dying abroad?”
Momen claimed if Bangladesh always drew the Saudi government’s attention to migrants being exploited there, adding that sometimes the workers did not inform any one until they returned to Bangladesh.
He said the government had arranged shelter homes for those abused and would bring them back to Bangladesh.
Asked if Bangladesh would stop sending female domestic workers to Saudi Arabia, Momen said the government “did not want to discriminate between men and women”.
If women want to go abroad, they won’t be prevented, he said.
Before talking to journalists, Momen handed over cheques of Tk 4.52 crore to those affected by the Makkah crane crash in 2015.
The cheques were offered by the Saudi Monetary Agency to the families of the one dead and two wounded Bangladeshi nationals.
‘WILL VERIFY MYANMAR’S CLAIMS’
Minister Momen said repatriation claims made by Myanmar would be verified as the country keeps spreading misleading information to the international community to stop it from happening.
“We’ll issue a press statement after verifying the claim,” he said.
The Myanmar Embassy in Dhaka in a Facebook post claimed 46 displaced persons returned to Myanmar from Bangladesh on their own on Thursday.
Comments