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A Modern-Day
"Slave Trade": Sri Lankan Workers in Lebanon
Reem
Haddad
In what can
be termed a modern-day slave trade, Sri Lankan women arrive in Lebanon
only to find themselves abused, imprisoned, raped, hungry, defenseless
and alone. Siriani P., 27, came to Beirut in a desperate attempt
to save her family from a life of poverty. Just ten months later,
however, she grabbed the first opportunity to run away from her
employers.
Clambering
into a taxi, Siriani frantically sought help. "Embassy, Sri Lankan
embassy," she told the driver, using the little English she knew.
But after searching in vain for her embassy, Siriani ended up wandering
the streets of Hamra in tears. With one eye swollen and a bump rising
on her forehead, she rubbed the red marks on her neck, signs that
"Madam" had, on many occasions, pulled Siriani's hair and banged
her head against the wall. Clasping her well-worn dress, she sobbed
as she recalled her mistress stripping her down to her underwear
and beating her thin body. Siriani's tied hands prevented her from
defending herself. The pain became even more unbearable when she
was thrown to the floor and trod on repeatedly. "I wanted to throw
myself from the ninth floor! I'd rather die than go on like this."
Siriani's weight
dropped dramatically after she came to Lebanon. Awakened daily at
4:00 AM, she was forbidden to eat before 5:00 PM. Even then, she
was only allowed to drink unpurified tap water with her meager meals
while the family drank bottled water. Locked inside all day, she
was unable to search for assistance.
Sri Lankan
women are usually recruited to work overseas by local agents who
promise riches in exchange for jobs abroad. Those who respond to
the offer are then required to pay a fee to the local agent -- up
to $500, an overwhelming sum for most. Many borrow the money, incurring
a debt, which, in the future, may prevent them from returning to
their country if their Lebanese employer denies them their wages.
At the other
end of the labor migration chain are various Lebanese agencies constituting
an unregulated -- and highly lucrative -- industry. At a cost ranging
from $1,500 to $3,000, a Lebanese family can "buy" a Sri Lankan
maid whose monthly salary will range from $100 to $150. The agency
draws up a contract committing the maid to her employer for two
or three years. Since the contract and negotiations are in Arabic,
the Sri Lankan woman usually has little understanding of what she
has committed herself to. The contract stipulates that the agency's
responsibility for the woman expires after three months. The employer
and the employee must then resolve any problems. If a dissatisfied
employer brings the maid back to the agency, she will likely be
beaten to render her "obedient."
After the initial
three-month period, employers become fully responsible for the servant.
If the woman leaves, the employer perceives it as an investment
loss. Consequently, many employers lock their Sri Lankan maids in
the house and control their freedom of movement by confiscating
their passports. "Keeping anyone locked up is imprisonment," protests
lawyer Mirella Abdel Sater. "It is illegal to force people to work
against their will or to take away their passports. A maid is free
to leave. If there is a breach of contract, then negotiations can
be undertaken. But employers have absolutely no right to detain
her against her will."
During a United
Nations review of human rights abuses in April 1998, committee members
"noted with concern the difficulties faced by many foreign workers
in Lebanon whose passports were confiscated by their employers.
The committee recommends that the state party should take effective
measures to protect the rights of these foreign workers by preventing
such confiscation and by providing an accessible and effective remedy
for the recovery of passports."
Many abused
women feel they have no choice but to escape. "Running away'
evokes the era of slavery," said Abdel Sater. "You leave
your job, but you run away only when enslaved." Since
all of the runaways have left their passports behind with their
employers, they must obtain new ones. But Lebanese authorities demand
$900 for every new passport -- a mandatory fee for processing travel
documents for non-Lebanese who lose their passports while in the
country.
If they can
somehow scrape this amount together, some women may still be forbidden
to leave, since many employers report runaway maids to the police
as thieves in order to track them down. "The employer cannot report
that their maid has run away. It is not illegal for her to do so,"
Abdel Sater explained, "so they tell the police she stole something."
Consequently, her name and picture are distributed to law enforcement
authorities throughout the country. An arrest warrant is issued
and the women are usually apprehended at the airport.
The police
have not been helpful to Sri Lankan maids escaping abusive employers.
Many police officers have demonstrated blatant racism when it comes
to protecting foreign women seeking their assistance. "I had a case
in which a Sri Lankan maid was raped by her employer," said Abdel
Sater. "I immediately sent her to the police. When she got there,
however, she learned that they already had a warrant for her arrest
because her employer had accused her of theft. Supposedly, the accusation
had been registered at the police station hours before she arrived.
It was impossible for her employer to have registered it that early,
though. I suspect he bribed the police to change the time of the
report to make it appear that he had submitted his accusation first."
Abdel Sater
indicated that she knew of many cases of police abuse. "Worse yet,
bruised and beaten woman are usually returned to their employers.
One maid I represented fled to the police bleeding. They dutifully
took her back and told her employer to stop beating her. No sooner
had the police left than the employer repeatedly banged the woman's
head against the wall. In desperation, the maid threw herself off
the balcony but survived. Neighbors found her and called me. The
woman now suffers from memory loss and a fractured skull. The police
had no right to return her -- it was their duty to protect her!"
Last August,
a Filipina housekeeper was arrested after her French employer called
the police to report a theft of a gold medallion. Linda Sacbibit,
42, charged that as soon as she entered the police interrogation
room, two policemen tied her wrists and ankles together, forcing
her into the fetal position. A long piece of wood was inserted behind
her knees, then placed across the top of two chairs and Sacbibit
hung head-down from it "like a roasted chicken," as she recounted
her experience tearfully through metal bars at Baabda prison. "They
began beating the soles of my feet with a cable of some sort. I
don't know how much time passed but it was a long time. Then they
untied me and made me stand in a pot of water. Soon after, they
tied me up and suspended me again," she said. "They slapped my face
and they beat my body with the wire repeatedly. I don't remember
more because I fainted."
When Sacbibit
woke up, she saw small black spots on her chest and arms but couldn't
remember how they got there. "The men then ordered me to wash my
face and arms because they were a little bloody from the rope's
friction. I had to hold my arms up to show them there was no blood
left. Then they made me run all around the room. They kept yelling
at me to confess that I stole the medallion and gave it to my boyfriend.
I told them I didn't steal anything and that I don't have a boyfriend,"
she said. "But they kept calling me a liar and continued beating
me."
The Philippines
embassy, however, refused to comment on Sacbibit's story. "The Philippines
embassy helps all its citizens," was the only answer offered by
the embassy's consular assistant, Berth Salvador, when pressed for
information.
"I can tell
you with 100 percent certainty that many people are being beaten
during investigations," said Roland Tawq, Sacbibit's lawyer. "These
police interrogations present the biggest problems for lawyers.
They beat our clients and force them to confess. But once the accused
reaches court, he or she will say something completely different."
For lawyer
Mirella Abdel Sater, who volunteers her time and expertise to help
foreign maids, the hundreds of cases she faces can be overwhelming.
"Sometimes I feel so helpless," she admitted. "I tell people what
the law requires, and they tell me: Get out of here, you and
your law!'." At one point, she decided to call abusive employers
and ask them to stop the beatings. "In return, they threatened me,"
she said. "They told me: We know important people and you'd
better watch out'. Once the police even called me in for questioning!
Since when do you question lawyers representing someone?"
Attempting
to punish employers through their servants proved futile. Once rested
and secure again, abused women never want to follow through with
lawsuits. "I always plead with them to go through with it, but they
always back down," Abdel Sater said. "When it comes time to go to
court, they just don't want to face their employers."
Even if they
did, Abdel Sater's work would still be sabotaged. "When we do file
a lawsuit, especially if it involves high officials, it is filed
so as to ensure an acquittal," she said. "Legally, I can't do anything.
My job has now become to increase public awareness: Don't beat them;
don't rape them. Everyone in Lebanon has someone powerful behind
him or her, though. The law can't reach them. I end up being the
one who's threatened."
Every Sunday,
hundreds of Sri Lankans and Filipinos gather at a Catholic church
in Beirut to hear the mass in their native languages. This is the
first stop for most runaways seeking support and guidance. Occasionally,
Lebanese members of the church's congregation will employ a runaway.
Complaints
from abused women prompted the Sri Lankan government to open an
embassy in Lebanon in 1998. A year later, the Sri Lankan community
admits that the embassy has facilitated the replacement of lost
passports. Yet other than opening a halfway house where runaway
Sri Lankan women can find shelter, it has been unable to stop the
mistreatment, rape, passport confiscation and illegal imprisonment
Sri Lankan women suffer at the hands of their Lebanese employers.
"An embassy
will do nothing in a country where the law does not protect people,"
Beiruti human rights advocate Tina Naccash complained. "What can
an embassy do if the Lebanese government, the legal system and the
police don't want to protect these women?"
Even Lebanon's
leading universities have been slow to take a stand against violence
occurring on their campuses. Two years ago, when a professor at
the American University of Beirut allegedly kicked his Sri Lankan
servant 17 times, the administration took no action to suspend him.
Earlier, the vice president of the Lebanese American University
had prevented the publication of a report on the abuse of foreign
workers in its quarterly women's studies journal, Al-Raida,
on the grounds that it was "too controversial." "If a university
cannot talk about controversy, who can?" asked Naccash.
The only way
to help foreign workers, Naccash believes, is through official diplomatic
representatives who can intervene on behalf of such women. Naccash
also calls for the Lebanese labor ministry to open a bureau of domestic
workers' affairs that would ensure that all relevant laws are applied
strictly to everyone on Lebanese soil.
Until then,
women like Malika K., 27, who spends all her free time searching
for her younger sister, Damica, are on their own. The agency that
brought Damica to Lebanon from Sri Lanka has refused to say where
the young woman was placed. In the 11 months since Damica arrived
in Beirut, she has written only one letter to her distraught mother.
In it, she described beatings, hunger and imprisonment. Malika fears,
not without reason, that her sister may now be dead.
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