Young Indian females are often lured by agents with false promises of domestic work in Malaysia and then subsequently coerced into commercial sex trade. Twenty-eight-year-old Laxmi (name changed), is among numerous Indian women who come to Malaysia in the hope of a better paying job, but end up falling victim to sex trafficking instead. Young […]
In early June, Nepali authorities announced that they would not issue work permits to outbound workers if employers did not bear the cost for visa and air ticket. The Ministry of Labor and Employment (MoLE) maintained that the provision was meant to prevent economic exploitation of workers in the name of recruitment fee and eventually […]
After the Department of Foreign Employment (DoFE) began issuing labour permits from its Tahachal office last year, the road leading to it past Soaltee Crowne Plaza was perpetually teeming with migrant workers lining up for their travel documents. But this week, after the government’s new zero-cost migration policy came into effect, the road is crowded […]
When everything is a commodity, labour rights count little, says Josiah Mortimer. There’s a war going on in Asia – and it’s one that, unlike ISIS in Iraq or the chaos in Syria, is failing to make the headlines. It’s the war on workers that is taking place across much of the continent, according to […]
The plan to export manpower to Malaysia under private management without a strict monitoring system may create room for abuse and exploitation of overseas job seekers, as seen in the past, warned labour rights activists. Malaysia last month announced that 15 lakh Bangladeshis would be recruited in the next three years under B2B (Business-to-Business) agreements.
“Qatar deserves the best”. That is the slogan on boundary boards along important roads in and around Doha, the capital, with a population of 1.7 million. It ranks as the world’s richest country per capita thanks to its natural gas reserves, the third largest in the world. The country is preparing for the 2022 FIFA […]
Malaysian authorities are found to have been violating their own law in not allowing migrant workers any trade union membership. Although the Malaysian Employment Act, 1955 guarantees all workers, including migrant workers, the right to join a trade union, immigration authorities and local employers are systematically preventing the migrant workers from being a part of […]