As is well known, slavery was formally abolished in Saudi Arabia as late as 1962, and then only after terrific pressure had been applied to the Saudis by Western governments. And today, when we speak of slavery in the Muslim world, we think of Mauritania (with 600,000 slaves), as the report in the past hour discussed, Niger (600,000 slaves), Mali (200,000 slaves), and Libya (where slave markets have opened in nine sites during the last two years). Most of us assume that in Saudi Arabia, slavery is no longer tolerated.
But most of us are wrong.
Slavery may have been formally abolished, but the cruel and savage treatment of foreign domestic workers, their inability to free themselves from arduous work conditions because their employers keep their passports and other documents, amount to slavery in all but name.
A report on one group of domestic slaves — Vietnamese women — by reporter Yen Duong, who interviewed former workers who had made it back to Vietnam, was published last year in Al Jazeera here:
Overworked, abused, hungry: Vietnamese domestic workers in Saudi Arabia.
Women say they are forced to work at least 18 hours a day, denied food, assaulted and refused the right to return home.
Pham Thi Dao, 46, says she worked more than 18 hours a day and was given the same one meal to live on – a slice of lamb and plain rice.
Dao, 46, was a domestic worker in Saudi Arabia for more than seven months until she returned to Vietnam in April.
“I worked from 5am until 1am in the morning, and was allowed to eat once at 1pm,” Dao told Al Jazeera of her experience in the port city of Yanbu. “It was the same every day – a slice of lamb and a plate of plain rice. After nearly two months, I was like a mad person.”
According to statistics from Vietnam’s labor ministry, there are currently 20,000 Vietnamese workers in the kingdom, with nearly 7,000 working as domestic staff for Saudi families…
The same harsh conditions which Vietnamese have endured have also been reported by the Filipino, Indonesian, and Sri Lankan workers, in Saudi Arabia. And they have also been endured by domestic workers in the the Emirates and Kuwait. In addition to the harsh working conditions, there is the persistent threat of sexual assault by their Arab masters. Some domestic workers have been raped and murdered by their Arab employers. Yet it has been almost impossible to bring employers to justice for such crimes.
Some who escaped have recounted slave-like working and living conditions.
“I understand that as [domestic] workers we need to get used to difficult working conditions,” said Dao, who is vocal on social media about her experience. “We didn’t ask for much, just no starvation, no beatings, and three meals per day. If we had that, we would not have begged for rescue.”…
“As soon as I arrived at the airport in Riyadh, they (employees from a Saudi company providing domestic workers) pushed me into a room with more than a hundred of others,” she said. “When my employer picked me up later, he took my passport and employment contract. Most women I’ve talked to here experience the same thing.”
By seizing the workers’ passports, the Saudi employers have complete control over them. They cannot leave the country, nor move about inside Saudi Arabia, nor go to work for another employer. And if they don’t have their employment contract, which has been seized by their employer, they have no way of knowing if the onerous conditions they endure violate the contract’s provisions. They are captives of their employer in every sense.
Like Dao, she said she was given one meal a day and worked 18-hour shifts.
Another domestic worker, who requested anonymity, showed Al Jazeera her contract stipulating a nine-hour working day – a standard given the contracts are composed by Vietnam’s labour ministry.
Dao shows notes from the Arabic lesson she took before her trip. Vietnamese domestic workers are entitled to classes on language, skills and culture but the sessions are poorly executed, say the workers.
When Linh asked to be moved to another family – a workers’ right according to their contracts – staff at the Vietnamese broker company shouted at her and tried to intimidate her.
She went on a hunger strike for three days until her employer agreed to take her back to the Saudi company…
Leaving an employment contract carries a hefty fine, plus the price of a ticket back to Vietnam, if the worker is unable to prove abuse at the hands of their employers.
The cost of quitting is usually between $2,500 and $3,500.
If workers get, at best, $388 per month, that means that if they manage to persuade their employer to give them back their passports and to let them leave, they will still have to come up with between seven and nine months of salary that must be paid back. And that assumes that they will be paid the highest amount ($388/month) and will have all other expenses, during that period of seven-to-nine months, paid by their employer.
Tuyet told her partner in Vietnam by phone that she is being abused by the family she works for in Riyadh.
Bui Van Sang’s partner, Tuyet, works in Riyadh.
He said she is being beaten and starved.
The Vietnamese broker company asked him for $2,155 for her return, but refused to put anything in writing, he claimed.
Her phone has been taken away and Sang is only able to contact her every two to three weeks, “when her employer feels like [allowing her]”.
These domestic workers are totally at the mercy of their Arab employers. They cannot even contact anyone in the outside world unless the employer “feels like [allowing her].” They are, essentially, prisoners whose brutal living and working conditions are set by the employer, who answers to no one. That constitutes slavery, whether or not it is called by that name.
By the time he had raised the $2,155, the Vietnamese broker company demanded double the payment, he said.
He travelled 1,500km from his southern Vietnamese home province of Tay Ninh to the capital, Hanoi, to beg the broker, but was turned away….
The Vietnamese brokers are akin to slave traders. They round up the “slaves” (domestic workers), hold out the promise of decent work and pay which, once those they traffic in arrive in Saudi Arabia, is simply ignored. The slaves have been delivered, the brokers paid by the Saudi employers, and the living conditions, of 18-hour days, with one meal a day, are now the norm. For beatings and sexual assaults, there is no recourse for these Vietnamese domestics. Meanwhile, Saudi employers hold onto those passports without which these workers cannot leave the country.
There are no independent organisations in either Saudi Arabia or Vietnam which ensure the safety of domestic workers.
In the past few years, reports of abuse have prompted Saudi authorities to suggest amendments to existing labor regulations, but rights groups say they fall short.
Whatever regulations are talked about, Saudi employers still do pretty much what they want in setting the conditions of work for domestic helpers.
Workers and their relatives have to rely entirely on the Vietnamese broker companies for support.
Linh, the domestic helper in Riyadh, said when she contacted the Vietnamese company that brought her there, they told her the employment contract is only valid in Vietnam, not in Saudi Arabia.
In other words, the Vietnamese brokers, having been paid by the Saudi employers, have washed their hands of the Vietnamese workers sent to Saudi Arabia. The employment contracts on which these domestic workers were relying are, they now admit, worthless in Saudi Arabia. These women have no guarantee of any rights; whatever their Saudi employer wishes to impose is what they must accept. Hence the 18-hour days, seven days a week, and the single meal each day. How is this not akin to slavery?
“They [the Vietnamese companies] are supposed to protect our rights, but all they do is yell at us,” Linh said by phone. “Now I just want to leave the country. If I go to the police, at least they’d bring me to the detention centre, and I’d be deported and allowed to leave.”
She recently livestreamed a video detailing the treatment that she and many fellow Vietnamese domestic helpers face while working in Saudi Arabia.
The video has been viewed 113,000 times.
“Many women I know here just want the same thing – they just want to leave,” she said. “But they are afraid, threatened, and don’t even dare to speak out.”
Their fear is palpable. If they complain of their working conditions, will they be beaten by their employers? Will they be given even more unpleasant or difficult tasks? Will the 18-hour day become a 20-hour day, as one Vietnamese man reported his wife had had to endure, that is with only four hours of sleep allowed? Will even the one slice of meat they are now given be reduced still further, or will they perhaps not be given meat at all? Will they no longer be allowed to call home even twice a month? Not all Saudi employers are simon-legrees, but a great many appear to be. The point is that domestic workers ought to have rights enshrined in the Saudi law, but they do not. And the conditions which they endure are scarcely distinguishable from slavery.
The Saudis are not alone in such mistreatment of their domestic workers. The Kuwaitis and the Emiratis have been difficult masters, too, but the conditions of domestic workers appear to be especially harsh in Saudi Arabia. The mentality that lies behind this mistreatment rests on two things. First, there is the deep belief that slavery is legitimate, given that Muhammad himself owned slaves, and does not become illegitimate in Islamic societies just because Western pressure has led to its formal prohibition. The slave-owner mentality remains. Second, these domestic workers — Vietnamese, Filipino, Thai, Indonesian, Sri Lankan — are almost all non-Muslims, and the treatment they receive is commensurate with their description in the Qur’an, as being “the most vile of creatures.” It would be interesting to compare the working conditions of the non-Muslim domestic workers in Saudi Arabia with those who, from Indonesia, are themselves Muslim. But that’s a subject for another occasion.
Shirley Ann says
What are The Obligations of Our STATE DEPT to make sure that Muslims are NOT bringing Slavery into America? What can be done when the Slaves are listed as “Family Members”? We have had several cases of Slavery, Being Practiced in Texas by Muslim “Guests” & I Hate to think there are many others that go REPORTED.
Antiislamicman says
It never stopped as Islam allows this in their scriptures.
mortimer says
“Slavery is a part of Islam … Slavery is part of jihad, and jihad will remain as long there is Islam.” As for the modernist interpretation that Islam totally abolished slavery, he dismissed its exponents saying, “They are ignorant, not scholars. … Whoever says such things is an infidel.”
– Sheikh Saleh Ibn Fawzan Ibn Abdullah, was member of the Council of Senior Scholars, Saudi Arabia’s highest religious body, which advises the king on religious matters. He is also currently a member of the Permanent Committee for Islamic Research and Issuing Fatwas, a committee of the Council of Senior Scholars.
mortimer says
Mecca had a thriving slave market in the 1960’s which shocked Malcolm X when he did the Hajj.
He chose to remain silent about this when he returned to America. For the ‘Nation of Islam’ it suited them to blame everything on white people.
In the 1990s, someone reported seeing an ad in a Saudi newspaper for the swap of a girl for a ‘nice car’.
elee says
Thank you for the information about Malcolm X. Kapo.
Mario Alexis Portella says
+1
Infidel says
Too bad that Malcolm X also chose to ignore the fact that Islam wasn’t a religion for Black supremacy, as he and his comrades preached: it’s a religion for Arab supremacy, including supremacy over Blacks. Which was well illustrated during the Sudanese civil war that saw Darfur Blacks persecuted by Khartoum Arabs
elee says
I was going to ask that a column be devoted to this. Please note that the Saudis dont just enslave Vietnamese. Large populations of Nepalis, Indians, and Filipinos are subject to the same enslavement. Hey duTerte, wanna do something brave for your people for a change? Naaahhh, hes too busy killing druggies…….Anybody else? U.N.? Feminists? Nope? Didnt think so.
gravenimage says
Yes–the victims are not just Vietnamese.
And you are right about Duterte–he is “tough” murdering drug addicts, but pals around with Jihad leaders.
drahcir says
Don’t forget the African victims, particularly those from Ethiopia and Nigeria. I have seen videos of these woman being beaten by the males of the households in which they worked and tied to leashes so that they could not leave.
Mario Alexis Portella says
And Trump keeps supporting those bastards? I’m all for military alliances but not at the cost of human rights!
RonaldB says
Surprise!! You form a military alliance, you’re stuck with your ally. Why are we stuck with Saudi Arabia? Because they buy our treasury bonds, funding our deficit spending. If countries like Saudi Arabia stopped purchasing our treasuries, the US would have to either simply print money without the fig leaf of bond purchases (hyperinflation) or drastically cut back on spending (social security, Medicare, Medicaid…all the geezers would be voting for Bernie Sanders).
So, we are Saudi’s slightly uppity mercenaries.
Truth says
USA needs to escape from Saudi money, even if it takes 50 years.
gravenimage says
The Saudis are no allies of ours.
Mario Alexis Portella says
May find this one interesting https://thegreatarchitect.blog/2019/06/27/should-the-u-s-continue-to-support-saudi-arabia/
Infidel says
Muslims don’t believe in human rights. We had Bush and Obama experiments in trying to bring democracy to the Muslim world, and just look at Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Egypt. Muslims don’t believe in human rights for anybody but themselves, so it’s best not to make that a criteria.
On RonaldB’s comments above, all that was true when the US and the world was a major importer of oil. But now, the US is one of the largest exporters of oil, Iran’s and Venezuela’s oil is off the market, and the crises around the Straits of Hormuz have made most of the Middle East’s customers turn to other sources, like the US, Russia and anyone else. In other words, Saudi Arabia and other countries may not be able to keep buying treasury bonds for much longer, so at some point, the US will have to address the deficit and debt problems
Mario Alexis Portella says
May find this one interesting https://thegreatarchitect.blog/2019/06/27/should-the-u-s-continue-to-support-saudi-arabia/
Mario Alexis Portella says
Surprise, surprise! Not just in Saudi Arabia but in so many parts of the Islamic world, too. https://thegreatarchitect.blog/2019/10/17/slavery-in-the-islamic-world/
gravenimage says
Mauritania has an estimated 17% of its population enslaved.
keya says
Saudis enslave Bangladeshi workers and abuse them too. Bangladesh is a muslim country. But the Arabs think they are much more superior as muslims than non arab muslims.
As long as muslims believe that Koran is the direct word of Allah the world will continue to suffer. Slavery is sanctioned by allah.
Infidel says
You’d think that Bangladeshis would wise up and apostatize en masse in protest against such discrimination. Like maybe embrace Buddhism, if they don’t wanna get hit by the Hindu caste system. But they pride themselves on being one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.
gravenimage says
True, keya and infidel.
And Infidel, the Hindu caste system has been, if not completely, at least largely dismantled.
Walter Sieruk says
Islam’s total lack of regard for basic human rights may be seen in the affront of slavery. Therefore it needs to be reiterated and exposed time and time again , that slavery is a heinous part of Islam is a topic that the apologists for that religion don’t like have people bring up .Nevertheless one writer revealed that “The senior clerics of Saudi Arabia’s highest body declared “Slavery is part of Islam and whoever wants it abolished is an infidel.” [1] Likewise, a former Muslim had exposed in his book that “Slavery is recognized as an institution and slave is considered both a thing as a person.” [2] In addition, two Christian writers in their book had also informs their readers that “Islam has enslaved more people than any other culture.” [3]
Therefore Islam regardless of what the apologists for this religion do claim has no regard for human rights
[1] THEY MUST BE STOPPED by Brigitte Gabriel page 187
[2] THE ISLAM IN ISLAMIC TERRORISM by Ibn Warraq page 85
[3] Jesus and the Jihadis, by Craig A Evens and Jeremiah J Johnston page 125.
Mr. Cohen says
***** QUICK QUOTES ABOUT ARABS AND
MUSLIMS PRACTICING SLAVERY *****
===================
QUOTE 1 OF 7:
“Although slavery had been outlawed in Britain and
the importation of slaves was illegal in the United States,
an active slave trade continued between Africa and the Arab nations.”
SOURCE: South Africa: 1880 to the Present
(chapter 3, page 44) by Bruce and Becky Durost Fish, year 2001,
Chelsea House Publishers, Philadelphia, ISBN 0-7910-5676-7.
===================
QUOTE 2 OF 7:
“Moreover, the ability of the Arabs to pay
depended on their success as slave hunters.”
SOURCE: The River War
(chapter 1, page 7) by Winston Churchill, year 1899
===================
QUOTE 3 OF 7:
Foremost of the leaders of the revolt [in Sudan
around year 1884] were the Arab slave dealers,
furious at the attempted suppression of their trade.
SOURCE: The River War
(chapter 2, page 27) by Winston Churchill, year 1899
Mr. Cohen says
===================
QUOTE 4 OF 7:
“Slavery was a flourishing institution in Arabia in the 1920s,
and for several decades thereafter. It was not formally abolished
in the Kingdom until 1962. The pilgrimage was the main source.
Nigerians and Sudanese would sell their children in Mecca
to help pay for their journey home, and the slave trade
was one traditional source of the shareefs’ wealth.”
“In Nejd every emir and sheikh had at least one black family
living in his household, and their children were assigned
as playmates to the children in the household of their
age and sex, growing up with them and often becoming
their close companions in adult life.”
“When Prince Faisal ibn Abdul Aziz visited New York [City]
in [year] 1944, the management of the Waldorf Astoria [hotel]
were shocked that he brought his slave Merzouk with him.”
SOURCE:
The Kingdom: Arabia and the House of Sa’ud
(chapter 22, page 177) by Robert Lacey, published year 1981
by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York,
ISBN-10: 0006365094 ISBN-13: 978-0006365099
Mr. Cohen says
QUOTE 5 OF 7:
“The government [of Saudi Arabia] hurriedly purchased the
freedom of 4,000-or-so slaves in the kingdom [of Saudi Arabia]
for £1,000 each, more than three-times the going rate-per-head
in the Buraymi market, and shrugged-off questions as to why,
at every UN debate on the subject up until the autumn of
[year] 1962, Sa’udi delegates had strenuously denied the
existence of any slavery in their country.”
SOURCE:
The Kingdom: Arabia and the House of Sa’ud
(chapter 37, page 345) by Robert Lacey, published in 1981
by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York,
ISBN-10: 0006365094 ISBN-13: 978-0006365099
MICROBIOGRAPHY FROM WIKIPEDIA:
“Robert Lacey (born 3 January 1944) is a British historian
and biographer. He is the author of a number of bestselling
biographies, including those of Henry Ford, Eileen Ford
and Queen Elizabeth II, as well as works of popular history.”
===================
QUOTE 6 OF 7:
“The missionaries were particularly appalled by the slave
trade in Africa. Although slavery had been outlawed in
Britain and the importation of slaves was illegal in the
United States, an active slave trade continued between
Africa and the Arab nations.
The missionaries wanted to create other commercial ventures
so that Africans could make a living without being dependent
on this odious system.”
SOURCE: South Africa: 1880 to the Present
(chapter 3, page 44) by Bruce and Becky Durost Fish, year 2001,
Chelsea House Publishers, Philadelphia,
www (dot) ChelseaHouse (dot) com * ISBN 0-7910-5676-7
===================
QUOTE 7 OF 7:
Brigitte Gabriel said:
“Mohammed himself owned dozens of slaves.
His followers continue to do so today.”
SOURCE: They Must Be Stopped:
Why We Must Defeat Radical Islam and How We Can Do It
(chapter 9, page 183) by Brigitte Gabriel, year 2008, year 2010,
St. Martin’s Press, 288 pages, ISBN 0312571283, ISBN 9780312571283.
PERSONAL COMMENT:
Thomas Jefferson (3rd President of the USA)
is often condemned for owning slaves by:
Liberals, Leftists, Progressives, and Socialists.
But amazingly, Mohammed, the founder
of Islam, is NEVER criticized
for owning DOZENS of slaves!
gravenimage says
Thank you for those quotes, Mr Cohen.
Lotus says
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_views_on_slavery
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery_in_the_Muslim_world
Infidel says
I know people are desperate, but for the life of me, I don’t understand why any non-Muslim seriously thinks that living in Muslim countries is a good idea. Particularly these gulf sheikhdoms
Yeah, slavery exists in not just the KSA, but de-facto, in other sheikhdoms in the region as well. Consider this: the first thing you have to do in these countries is surrendering your passport. Making yourself a hostage in that country, since you can’t go anywhere else w/o it. That alone should make one pause. In other countries, if a foreigner commits a crime, his visa is impounded, and he’s deported back to his country (maybe after a jail term, depending on the crime). But the fact that a foreigner loses his/her passport makes him/her a hostage, plain and simple.
And from the POV of these Arab Muslim countries, why do they take non-Muslims into the Arabian peninsula, which is supposed to be off-limits to infidels? They need slaves? Well, it’s not like they regard all Muslims as equal: they have a hierarchy that would make the Hindu caste system look egalitarian by comparison. First in the pecking order are peninsula Arabs (Quraysh tribes of Mohammed), then other Arabs in countries like Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Egypt and elsewhere in North Africa. Then they have other Muslims – Abeds as they call them – from Africa and elsewhere in Asia. They can import an endless number of slaves from Pakistan and Bangladesh, and pay them even less than they do Vietnamese or Filipinos. Also, they don’t risk their countries getting overpopulated by non-Muslims, as they well do w/ people from Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Thailand, India… Besides, just north of them are those ‘Palestinians’, who are allegedly poverty stricken: they could just import and enslave them – they’d not only have Muslims, but Arab Muslims at their beck and call. People who know the language and follow the religion.
gravenimage says
All of these countries should be warning their citizens.
Angemon says
“but for the life of me, I don’t understand why any non-Muslim seriously thinks that living in Muslim countries is a good idea.”
Some are uninformed, others are misinformed, I’d wager… In addition, of course, to the relatively few who have the status/skills to have a prestigious/important job, ensuring them a different treatment.
James says
a minor point, perhaps irrelevant. I have read somewhere, perhaps Robert Spencer, that slavery was not condemned by Jesus or the New Testament. Slave holders in the past went to church and still believed in slavery. In the Holocaust, the treatment of Jews and gypsies was worse than that of slaves, even though Germany is a Christian country with both Catholics and Protestants. Scriptures alone do not explain how people act. Perhaps Muslims could reject slavery despite their scriptures. People just have to treat some things in the scriptures as having an expiration date or being metaphorical and not literal, which they do for Christian scriptures. Or one can discover the forbidding of slavery in a secret koranic code. Or Allah could give a revelation to some imams. I believe the Mormons had a revelation from God that prohibited future polygamy, which made possible admission as a state. Muslims could perhaps also experience such a revelation from Allah. Stranger things have happend.
gravenimage says
Some Christian slave-owners did try to specifically justify slavery by the Bible. But many more abolitionists found passages that they felt condemned slavery. Most abolitionists, in fact, were devout Christians.
Note that Jesus never held slaves–in fact, he ministered to slaves.
This is not the case with Mohammed, He not only held slaves, he was a slave traders, enslaved his victims, and used girls as sex slaves. The “Prophet” is held to be the “perfect man” and model for all time in Islam, so no pious Muslim can really condemn slavery.
Cameron H says
I arrived in KSA for the first time in Riyadh, stepped into the terminal, what did I see? A sea of young Muslim girls all in black, I assumed they were Malaysians, young maids for rich Saudi families. All huddled together pushed around by armed guards in the airport terminal. They all had a look of fear, the faces I could see anyway.
After a year in Saudi I’d had enough, the place disgusted me, and delighted me at the same time, there were warm friendly people, expats as well, interesting places and sights to see. What disgusted me was the virtual slave trade, they do take your passport off you, it’s difficult getting it back without a good reason. Your employer has all the power. I was also disgusted at how others were treated. White westerners were treated the best, Filipinos, the largest group of expat workers, then Malaysians, South Africans, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis., and many others. The non white, non Arabs were treated like dirt, poorly paid, although the pay was a lot better than what they would get in their home countries, still conditions were terrible.
I’d definitely never go back, not for all the money in the world. Unfortunately the aforementioned nationals have no choice.
gravenimage says
Slavery Persists In Saudi Arabia
…………….
Saudi Arabia still had open slave markets when I was a toddler.
But these vicious Muslim thugs have never really given it up.
David Ashton says
And Muslim immigrants in Britain think they are hard done by.
obrlnews says
50% of Muslims are basically slaves, the women. They have few life-choices given to them, must submit to loveless polygamous marriages, starting at very young ages, and then breed like rabbits to sustain any respect within that “family”. Younger women beaten by older ones, raped by the dominant male, children become a commodity lacking in mother-love. Sexual love nearly nonexistent. Anal intercourse a favored method, as is pedophilia of boys. If wealthy, concubine slave girls can add to a man’s harem beyond the four legal wives allowed by Muhammed. James DeMeo, “Saharasia”.