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November 26, 2005

Pakistan: More Child Jockeys Arrive Home To An Uncertain Future

The scandal of camel racing in the United Arab Emirates led to an international outcry, when it was revealed that young children, mostly from the Indian subcontinent were kept in appalling conditions, and many arrived in their situations as jockeys as a result of child-trafficking. Separated from their families, the children were often starved to keep their weights low for the races, and received little or no pay, and no education. Often they were beaten to keep them compliant.

The Bangladeshi Women Lawyers' Association noted that during the 1990s as many as 7,000 boys were smuggled out of Bangladesh to be used as camel jockeys. In 1980, the UAE banned the use of children under 15 from partaking in this sport, but the Australian Broadcasting Corporation documented children as young as three and four being forced to take part. In September 2002, a ban was imposed on children who were younger than 15 or -weighing LESS THAN 99 pounds from being used, with a fine of $5,500 for a first offence.

A report by the UN from June 1999, in response to a 1998 report by the organisation Anti-Slavery documented the abuse of children for camel racing in the UAE, stated that children as young as four were trafficked from Africa and Asia for this sport. Unlike horse-riding, the child would be strapped to the camel. The UAE appeared to disregard its own legislation regarding underage children, in some cases because

those who own racing camels and employ the children come from powerful local families that are in effect above the law."

The UAE has ratified the International Labour Organisation's Convention No. 29 which prohibits "forced or compulsory labour", as well as the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Both of these international standards are violated in the case of child camel jockeys.

Most children in camel racing came from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sudan. To be fair, some UAE politicians were against the trade, as noted in a report by PBS from 2003, which stated that the foreign minister, Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayid, did call for a crackdown on the use of child jockeys.

This year saw a change, and an agreement with UNICEF saw the first children returning from summer onwards. The first consignment of children back to Pakistan happened on 21 June, when 22 children were brought home. The UAE agreed to repatriate an estimated 3,000 children employed as camel jockeys.

We reported on the first arrivals back to Bangladesh in August, and noted in October that even though 225 Bangladeshi children had been repatriated by then, 58 of these children had not been reunited with their parents, because of "legal complexity" -i.e. ascertaining if a child's parents were the real parents, or if they were considered "fit" to be parents, considering some had willingly sold their children into the trade.

Similar problems exist in Pakistan. UNICEF and Pakistan officials who met the first batch of arrivals in June placed the children into orphanages, until the conditions of family reunion could be arranged.

In Pakistan in September, one family demanded an inquiry commission into the actions of traffickers who had taken their two children and sold them, stated the Daily Times. Makhan and his wife Sakina were taken to UAE via Iran by an "agent", who then sold Allah Rakka And Allah Ditta to sheikhs. There are questions to be asked in this case about the parents' original motives for travelling with the agent. On September 10 Makhan had been sent to a detention camp, where he had to pay bail to be released.

The problems of trying to readjust the children, who have in many cases been traumatised and starved of familial love, are enormous, and readjusting them back into society is hard enough. This task is made worse if their own families in some cases were complicit in their initial involvement in camel-racing. On October 22, the Pak Tribune reported that 400 children had been returned from UAE, according to Minister of State for Overseas Pakistanis, Tariq Azeem Khan. He was opening a rehabilitation centre for such children in Rawalpindi, called Kareem House. The house was named after a small child, who had fallen from his camel during one of the races, and had been killed.

Yesterday (November 25), Mr Khan (pictured with new arrivals) was at Allama Iqbal International Airport to welcome 64 children on their flight from Abu Dhabi. These children will be looked after by the Ansar Burney Trust, a group which had pressured the UAE on its abuse of immigrant children in camel racing. Fahad Burney, Vice Chairman of the trust said: "The children used for modern day slavery as camel jockeys were forced to work up to 18 hours a day in the desert heat and fed three biscuits a day to keep their weight down."

This story, as I have been researching and writing it, has depressed me more and more. The plight of a child to be sent away or abducted is hard enough for a young person to bear. To be forced to race in a frightening sport, at risk of life and limb with no parents to help them is worse than something penned by Charles Dickens. And knowing that rich sheikhs deliberately allowed this abuse to happen to small vulnerable children, just so they could gamble and make money in a sport makes me both saddened and angry.

The journey back to normality for these 64 children who arrived back on their home soil yesterday will be hard, and some may never make it back to a loving family home. One can only hope that they are given the best support and care possible, and can find some of that love they have been denied for so long.

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at November 26, 2005 4:49 PM

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