{"id":219123,"date":"2018-04-03T17:32:44","date_gmt":"2018-04-03T17:32:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/?p=219123"},"modified":"2019-02-05T02:36:04","modified_gmt":"2019-02-05T07:36:04","slug":"kuwait-to-recruit-ethiopian-workers-amid-philippines-labor-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/219123","title":{"rendered":"Kuwait to recruit Ethiopian workers amid Philippines labor crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"

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KUWAIT CITY (AFP) \u2013 Kuwait will recruit Ethiopian nationals to make up for a “deficit” in domestic workers, authorities said Tuesday, April 2, following the grisly murder of a Filipina worker in the Gulf state.<\/p>\n

The Philippines banned its citizens from working in Kuwait after the body of 29-year-old Joanna Demafelis was found in a freezer earlier this year, bearing signs of torture.<\/p>\n

“We aim to open the door to the recruitment of Ethiopian workers to fill the deficit of domestic servants and reduce prices,” General Talal Al-Maarifi, head of Kuwait’s General Department of Residency Affairs, told AFP.<\/p>\n

Ethiopia 5 years ago instituted a similar ban, following reports of abuse and complaints that employment agencies lured its citizens to work under illegal and appalling conditions. The ban was lifted last Thursday, March 29.<\/p>\n

Maarifi said there were more than 15,000 Ethiopians currently living and working in Kuwait.<\/p>\n

Kuwaiti police in March 2017 detained a woman for filming her Ethiopian employee falling from the seventh floor without trying to rescue her.<\/p>\n

The 12-second video shows the Ethiopian woman hanging outside the building, with one hand tightly gripping the window frame, as she begs for help.<\/p>\n

Rights groups have voiced alarm over the plight of workers in the Gulf and other Arab countries, where migrant labor is regulated under a system known as “kafala”.<\/p>\n

The kafala, or sponsorship, system ties migrant workers’ visas to their employers, prohibiting workers from leaving the country or changing jobs without prior consent. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KUWAIT CITY (AFP) \u2013 Kuwait will recruit Ethiopian nationals to make up for a “deficit” in domestic workers, authorities said Tuesday, April 2, following the grisly murder of a Filipina worker in the Gulf state. The Philippines banned its citizens from working in Kuwait after the body of 29-year-old Joanna Demafelis was found in a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4588,4516,4517],"class_list":["post-219123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ethiopian-news","tag-ethiopia","tag-kuwait","tag-philippines"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-V0f","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=219123"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":219171,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/219123\/revisions\/219171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=219123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=219123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=219123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}