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MFA Task Forces Strategy Meeting
22-27 January 2008; Manila, Philippines
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Migration and Development
The 2nd Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) will be held on 27-30 October 2008 in Manila, Philippines. The GFMD is a government-led initiative that is open to all 192 United Nations Member States.
It is not a decision-making or policymaking body. It is a voluntary process, that wants to address issues related to migration and development in a manner that goes beyond mere analysis. It should identify best practices, promote the exchange of experiences, identify obstacles to smart policymaking, explore and adopt innovative approaches, and enhance cooperation among countries. More...
SEE ALSO:
UN High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development 2006
Global Forum on Migration and Development 2007
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Migrant Domestic Workers
Domestic Work is Work!! Respect the rights , status and dignity of domestic workers!!!
MFA together with the Asian Migrant Centre (AMC), Coalition for Migrants Rights (CMR) and the Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME) in cooperation with the Serikat Buruh Migran Indonesia (SBMI) organized the Second Asian Domestic Workers Assembly (ADWA) in Jakarta, Indonesia.
The 2nd ADWA was a follow of the first Asian Migrant Domestic Workers Assembly held in Manila Philippines, on 16-17 June 2007. The 2007 assembly in Manila paved the way for the creation of the Asian Domestic Workers Alliance (ADWA), a joint Asian regional platform to promote the rights, welfare and empowerment of migrant domestic workers (MDWs). This 2nd Assembly aims to collectively discuss and finalize the formation of the ADWA Steering Committee; to finalize and adopt a Strategic Action Plan of ADWA; also to analyze gains/successes, gaps/needs, challenges, opportunities and difficulties/obstacles to organizing work, advocacy and empowerment of MDWs. More...
2nd ADWA Statement
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MFA Statement
Protect the peoples of Burma in Thailand and Malaysia
Migrant Forum in Asia (MFA) is extremely concerned about the poor protection of the peoples of Burma in Southeast Asia.
The peoples of Burma have been driven by persecution, conflict, state-sanctioned violence, and desperate poverty into neighboring countries. More than a million people reside in Thailand and Malaysia alone. As large numbers have not been able to secure official legal status - whether as migrant workers or refugees - they face tremendous risks working and living as an undocumented population.
While their labor contributes to the economies of Thailand and Malaysia, they are seen as a threat to national security because of their irregular status. They are therefore under constant threat of arrest, detention, and deportation. In order to survive, they are forced to seek informal means of traveling and searching for work. This increases their vulnerability to exploitation. There are many who work under dangerous conditions, are not compensated for accidents in the workplace, and suffer from unpaid wages. Many are trafficked for sex and labor. More...
See also:
AMC Statement
54 Myanmar migrants die in Thailand
Deaths highlight plight of Myanmar migrants
54 Burmese Migrants Die in Thailand
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West Asia
The Gulf Forum on Temporary Contractual Labour: Ushering in a New Era of Cooperation on Labour Movement
On 21-22 January 2008, the Ministerial Consultation on Overseas Employment And Contractual Labour for Countries of Origin and Destination in Asia was held in Abu Dhabi. The Ministerial meeting, the first meeting to be hosted by a receiving country, aimed to highlight the potential of contractual labour to benefit overseas workers as well as the development of countries of origin and destination in Asia.
Held back to back with the Ministerial meeting was the Forum on Contractual Labor in GCC Countries: Opportunities and Challenges which was organized by the UAE Ministry of Labor and the Council of Ministers of Labor and Social Affairs in GCC States, in collaboration with the IOM, ILO Sub-Regional Office for Arab States and the Arab Labor Organization on 23-24 January.
MFA was invited to be among the panelists in the forum and speak about "The Temporary Contractual Characted of Expatriate Labor in GCC Countries". MFA members who participated in the forum were: Dr. Chowdhury Abrar (RMMRU, Bangladesh), Rafeek Azeez (CIMS, India), Ellene Sana (CMA, Philippines) and William Gois (MFA Secretariat).
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Trade and Development
CALL TO ACTION AGAINST THE G8
Resisting Free Trade, Militarism and Fighting for Real Solutions to Climate Change
The G8 Summit will be held this year from July 7-9 in Toyako, Hokkaido, Japan. This will be a culmination of a series of ministerial preparation meeting beginning in March. The G8 Action Network, a network of various Japanese organizations and movements, is calling on all social movements, peasant organizations, women, migrants, urban and rural poor, fisherfolks and civil society from all over the world who are resisting free trade in its many forms, war and militarism and fighting for and building real people based solutions to global warming, to come and join us in the week of action against the G8 here in Japan.
WHY MOBILIZE AGAINST THE G8?
The G8 nations account for just fourteen percent of the world’s population and yet decisions made at these summits dictate the course of the rest of the world. And now more than ever, the evidence is stark that decisions that these nations have made have brought nothing but worsening poverty, increasing insecurity, deepening indebtedness, militarization and wars and now they are pushing for market based solutions to climate change which threaten to endanger the future of the planet. The host of the summit, the Government of Japan, says that it will make this summit a summit on the climate. This is rank hypocrisy. The reality is that the government, under pressure from Japanese industry, is backing away from mandatory limits to greenhouse gas emissions.
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COUNTRY UPDATES |
Sri Lanka
Bahrain assures Lankans' welfare
COLOMBO, 24 March 2008: Sri Lanka and Bahrain yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding guaranteeing security and welfare of Sri Lankan expatriate workers in Bahrain including improving their service conditions and extending more State patronage and attention to their well-being.
Addressing the media Foreign Employment and Welfare Minister Keheliya Rambukwella said "a longstanding wish of President Mahinda Rajapaksa to have a system and mechanism to ensure the safety, security and welfare of Sri Lankans who sought foreign employment has been realised. "We had come a long way to improve the environment of the employees who sought overseas jobs. It was necessary to formulate measures and systems to forge understanding between Sri Lanka and foreign countries employing Sri Lankans", he added.
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Malaysia
Lenggeng riot: 'A disaster waiting to happen'
It was only a matter of time before trouble broke out at the 14 immigration detention centres taken over earlier this year by voluntary corps Rela - as the Lenggeng incident in Negri Sembilan has proved.
"We anticipated it to happen sooner or later. Lenggeng is only the beginning of worse things to come," said Migrant Care coordinator Alex Ong when contacted yesterday.
Ong was commenting on the riot on Monday in which about 60 Burmese detainees reportedly tried to pull down the perimeter fence and afterwards torched an administration building.
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Singapore
(18 March 2008) Jobless and short of cash after being 'duped by agents', 50 workers from India have made the streets their home By Theresa Tan , Melissa Sim PENNILESS, jobless and hungry.
That is the plight of a group of about 50 Indian workers who have made the streets and open spaces in Little India their home - some for as long as a year.
Many of the workers, who have turned the five-foot ways in Cuff Road into a makeshift camp, claim they had paid good money to come to Singapore in search of jobs, but were duped by agents when they landed here.
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Hong Kong
One Small Victory for Indonesian Migrant Workers in Hong Kong
Sunday, 17 February 2008, in the face of a mass action by migrant domestic workers who held a two day hunger strike, finally the Indonesian Consul General in Hong Kong, Mr. Ferry Adamhar announced the withdraw of his policy No. 2258/IA/XII/2008. This policy required all Indonesian migrant workers to get permission from both their agency and the Consulate before they could change their employment agency leading to the continued extortion of migrant workers through the 7 months wage deduction.
The announcement from the consul general was made only after a month long campaign by the Hong Kong Coalition of Indonesian Migrant Workers Organization (KOTKIHO) and the Indonesian Migrants Workers Union (IMWU). Since the first week of January, nearly almost every Sunday, these two migrants domestic workers organization and union have been working very hard to organize mass actions and public awareness programs in order to widen support to push for the withdrawal of the SE 2258 policy, until finally they decided to conduct a hunger strike in front of the Indonesian Consulate Office in Leighton Road, Causeway Bay starting on Saturday, 16 February 2008.
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South Korea
In commemoration of the Yeosu Detention Center fire deaths: International Day of Action for Migrant Workers' Rights
A year ago February 11th a tragic fire broke out at the Yeosu Foreigners’ Detention Center in South Korea, killing ten migrant workers and wounding dozens more. This event was a direct result of the South Korean governments’ policy of crackdown and deportation of undocumented migrant workers and the poor conditions in detention centers.
A year later nothing has changed and repression against migrant workers and migrant workers’ organizing continues. The government has carried out a severe attack against the Migrants’ Trade Union, a union built by and for migrant workers, arresting and deporting its leadership in a targeted crackdown at the end of last year. It is also attempting to revise South Korean immigration law to make it legal to enter buildings without warrants during immigration raids and stop anyone on the street ‘suspected of being an undocumented migrant.”
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