Despite the challenging setup foreign nationals in the Gulf State are facing, Kuwait’s Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Al-Jarallah guarantees that the rights of expatriate workers in the country are well-protected.
According to Khaled, by giving foreign workers suitable working conditions, a breakthrough in the country’s numerous goals and projects will be realized because expat workers are known to play a vital role in Kuwait’s economic development, as it has been for many years already.
Foreign Minister Guarantees Rights and Safety of Foreign Workers in Kuwait
Khaled added that Kuwait is implementing a vast number of laws and legislation particularly dealing with the welfare of expats. In line with this, Khaled shared that the government is also willing to modify existing laws to provide a better justice system to expats works and their rights as well, as shared in a report by the Kuwait Times.
At present, the total number of expats living in Kuwait is at 3.3 million, 700,000 of which are working as domestic helpers. Compared to the 1.4 million Kuwaiti citizens, expats take a higher number in the population, thus, their welfare should also be prioritized according to Khaled.
In the meantime, there have also been proposals from the parliament to reduce the number of expats in Kuwait and impose higher taxes on them, particularly on the remittances they send to their home countries.
In recent years, Kuwait has been named by expat community websites as the worst destination for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), especially among those who are working as domestic workers.
To address the growing number of ill-treated OFWs in the Gulf State, the Philippine government last year has imposed a total deployment ban, which was only lifted after a memorandum of understanding (MOU) in regard to the protection of the rights of Filipino workers was signed by both countries.
The initiative and logic of Kuwait Foreign Minister Khaled Al-Jarallah as to how the government should treat foreign workers in the country should spark some hope for foreign nationals who are torn whether or not they should stay any longer in the country, considering the situation in the region, as well.
However, there is a strong need for the government of Kuwait to uphold the rights and safety of foreign workers in the country regardless of any internal agreements with any country they are working with because this is the very essence of human rights anywhere in the world.
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