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Paid with Bullets

‘Rights of Migrant Workers’. The very concept may sound funny to most migrant workers toiling in Europe and elsewhere. The international conference on co-operation among National Human Rights Institutes was held in Kathmandu, Nepal from 26th-27th November, 2012. The meet, rather the summit of official rights champions, was supposed to identify key issues and challenges regarding protection of the rights of migrant workers and explore ways to address them through a joint strategy, which could be adopted by the NHRIs and governments of the region.

The Kathmandu conclave urged the governments to promote universal ratification of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers and members of their families, 1990, including implementation of all other international UN human rights treaties and ILO conventions relevant to the rights of the migrant workers.

But all this tall talk makes little sense to migrants who are living in host countries almost as slaves. Not very long ago at least 30 Bangladeshi migrant workers alongwith other workers in a Greek farm—Strawberry farm in Manaloda— were sprayed with bullets by the owner party.

What’s the immediate result? It’s blood and pain of the migrants, agony and pain of their dear ones. A few of the perpetrators of the ‘‘faithful’’ act have fled away. It can be hoped, somewhat against hope, that they will someday be brought to books.

What was the crime the Bangladeshi migrant workers committed? They sought pay unpaid for more than six months. Over a long time, the workers were assured repeatedly that payment would be made. Now, they have been paid with bullets. And, the farm turned red with blood. The workers had been promised 22 Euro (18.80 Pound) for 7-hour shifts.

But what will happen to the families dependent on the deceased workers’ income? To the money the workers borrowed for migration? And, to their dream—a better life? Time, no doubt, will find all the answers to what happened to whom—the hapless Bangladeshi migrants, their families, the debt, the owner, the hired killers.

Greece has a chequered history of treating migrant workers as medieval slaves. In December 2012, Amnesty International made a scathing remark on refugees, asylum-seekers and migrants in Greece. ‘Greece was failing to respect the rights of asylum-seekers and migrants... Greece was proving itself incapable of providing even the most basic requirements of safety and shelter to the thousands of asylum-seekers and migrants arriving each year?’

Meanwhile, retired judges and bureaucrats will convey more international seminars on the plight of migrants without really succeeding to implement their own recommendations to improve the lot of migrants across the globe. It is the question of how to get organised in a foreign country because most governments, even European governments have forfeited their social-welfare status. ooo
[contributed]

Frontier
Vol. 45, No. 44, May 12-18, 2013

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