Child slavery is alive and well

zenith-nadir

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Child camel jockeys find hope - Friday, 4 February, 2005

Children from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sudan are still being smuggled to the United Arab Emirates to work as camel jockeys, despite a law passed two years ago banning their use.

But young children can still be seen at racetracks across the UAE, and aid workers estimate there are up to 40,000 working across the Gulf.

Akbar is eight years old, and has spent almost all his life living and working as a camel jockey at a race track in Abu Dhabi. Four days before I met him, he was picked up by police and brought to the new rehabilitation centre, the brain-child of human rights activist, Ansar Burney.

"We are giving them an education," Mr Burney tells me, as he shows me round the neat classroom and air-conditioned bedrooms. "How to sleep, how to take a bath, how to go to the toilet: they don't know how to use the cupboards; they don't know how to sleep on beds! This is all new for them."
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Group Reports 880 Sudanese Slaves Freed - Fri Feb 4, 8:03 PM ET

CAIRO, Egypt - Arab tribes in northern Sudan have freed 880 slaves during the past two weeks and allowed them to returned to southern Sudan, a Swiss-based group said Friday.

The American Anti-Slavery Group says more than 200,000 people currently labor as slaves in Mauritania, Niger and Sudan, nations on centuries-old Arab-African Saharan trade routes.

Sudan denies the existence of slavery in the country but acknowledges that tribesmen "abduct" people. But under international pressure, the government set up a committee to work for the release of those being held.
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Too bad the UN is too busy investigating itself for stealing oil for food $$$ to care....at least there are people like human rights activist, Ansar Burney and the American Anti-Slavery Group to pick up the slack.
 
It must not be doing that well. My shoes were still expensive.
 
In Qatar they're using Swiss made robot camel jockeys, so perhaps the practice will catch on in other nations where this sport is popular.

I think I'd like to read the article about slavery in Sudan, but the link seems to be broken.
 
zenith-nadir said:
Too bad the UN is too busy investigating itself for stealing oil for food $$$ to care....at least there are people like human rights activist, Ansar Burney and the American Anti-Slavery Group to pick up the slack.
Click to expand...

Thanks for bringing that up...it is an issue that doesn't IMO get nearly enough airing.
 
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