UPDATES TO KAFALA
The definitive place to get the latest updates on Kafala.
August 26, 2020 | English
Lebanon is a highly stratified capitalist society with limited protections for working class people. Fuelled by self and special interests, the elite has long abandoned the needs of the working class. The blast that took place on August 4, 2020 was merely a symptom of this.
August 26, 2020 | English
As the Lebanese economic crisis worsens by the day, thousands of migrant workers remain stuck in limbo as they struggle to leave the country. Since June, dozens of migrant domestic workers have rallied in Beirut outside their respective consulates, and many have been left without pay or passports as employers left them unable to return home as they stopped paying or accommodating them.
August 25, 2020 | English
“Migrant workers and refugees are systematically dehumanized and marginalized in Lebanon, in life and in death,” AMR denounced in a statement. The double explosion of the port of Beirut and its shock wave killed at least 181 people and left more than 6,500 injured, according to the latest report. But several NGOs, including the AMR, pointed out the difficulties in identifying immigrant victims, which were not taken into account in the first official reports, “mainly excluding people of non-Lebanese origin”.
August 24, 2020 | English
Domestic workers in Lebanon organized a sit-in protest outside the Kenyan consulate in Beirut in solidarity of a fellow worker reportedly fired for being too sick to work. She was thrown out of the house she worked in and left without payment or healthcare outside the consulate.
August 24, 2020 | English
Tarik Kebeda, a 22-year-old Ethiopian who came to work in Lebanon , seeks to leave this country that she loves but where she "can no longer live" after the explosion in early August in Beirut, which destroyed walls and shattered all the windows of her old house.
August 24, 2020 | Indonesian
Beirut - Ledakan dahsyat di Beirut telah mengantarkan Lebanon ke jurang krisis ekonomi. Para pekerja migran pun meminta untuk dipulangkan.
August 24, 2020 | English
After struggling first through Lebanon's economic crisis and then the coronavirus pandemic, Ethiopian worker Tarik Kebeda said the deadly blast that ripped through her Beirut home was the final straw.
August 21, 2020 | English
Some employers have also reported the women to the police for alleged theft. This is a common practice used to avoid paying outstanding wages and return tickets, and a way to disavow any responsibility for the employee. And now this tactic seems to be serving another purpose as well. "One of the madams wrote: You stole a hairdryer, if you give it back, you'll get your passport. But that's just a trick to make the worker come back, so that she can be locked up," says Foi'elle.
August 20, 2020 | English
The impact of Lebanon’s dire economic situation and the aftermath of the devastating Beirut explosion on domestic workers is being amplified after a video of a woman abandoning her maid near the Kenyan embassy in the capital went viral.
August 20, 2020 | English
Thousands of migrant workers in Lebanon are desperate to return home as a coronavirus lockdown began this week, adding to woes caused by a financial crisis and this month's port blast that wrecked swathes of the capital Beirut.