MODERN SLAVERY IN MIDDLE EAST
2.8 million women employed in households across the Gulf are at risk of slavery, if not enslaved yet.
371 Kenyan women died in Saudi Arabia in the course of their employment as domestic workers between 2020 and April 2024. This number does not include missing individuals and the thousands who returned injured, as well as those who were killed or injured in other countries in the Gulf region
The "kafala" system, a regulatory framework that gives employer sponsorship permit to bring in foreign workers, institutionalizes exploitation and favors modern day slavery. Indeed, these workers are often openly auctioned either on the black market or online.
98.73% of Kenyan returnees from the Gulf have been found to be victimized through different forms of slavery, including forced labor and sexual exploitation.
Global Justice Kenya has initiated a survivor-led project in Kenya with the purpose of providing survivors with restorative justice, and ending exploitation, abuse and killing of women migrating to Saudi Arabia as domestic workers.
Saudi Arabia is one of the most dangerous places in the world for domestic foreign workers. Between 2020 and April 2024, at least 371young Kenyan women employed as domestic workers under abusive conditions died in Saudi Arabia. Hundreds of returnees suffer permanent injuries as a consequence of excessive work, unsanitary living conditions, denied medical attention, life threats, sexual harassment, beatings and torture.
These numbers do not include missing persons and anyway reveal a disproportionate rate of death of Kenyan domestic workers in Saudi Arabia compared with deaths in other Gulf states.
OUR STRATEGY
CREATING A PRECEDENT TO DISMANTLE A SYSTEM
Feith Murunga survived Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery. Her Saudi Arabia employer burnt her left arm with boiling water as a punishment because she sent home pictures of her swollen face to prove abuse at her work place.
Feith survived because her story went viral, sparking outrage among the Kenyan public who raised funds to rescue her.
Today Feith is GJK Survivor Liaison Officer. GJK and Feith are documenting hundreds of claims of Kenyan women either injured or killed while working in Saudi Arabia. GJK has hired a legal council to research possible courses of action leading to remedy for Feith and all the other cases. GJK is also creating a survivors' network aimed at amplifying the voices of returnees and the families of those killed.
Feith and Kenyan Women intend to pave the way to end exploitation of millions of domestic foreign workers in the Middle East.
Help Feith and hundreds of women to dismantle the chain of profit behind the exploitation of women in the Middle East.