US embassy cable - 04ABUDHABI3209

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ABU DHABI 003209 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR G/TIP, INL, DRL, SA/INS, NEA/RA, AND NEA/ARP 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/14/14 
TAGS: PHUM, PREL, TC, IN, NP, RP 
SUBJECT: TIP CASES SHOW UAE STILL CHALLENGED 
 
REF:  DUBAI 1267 
 
1. (U) This is an action request for G/TIP and NEA/ARPI 
country desk, please see paragraph 9. 
 
2. (C) SUMMARY: A number of recent trafficking cases in the 
UAE point to the continuing challenges in the TIP arena 
here.  There is a growing difference in views between Dubai 
police and public prosecutors on how to best handle 
trafficking cases.  Police say they want to break the 
criminal rings that facilitate trafficking by prosecuting 
traffickers.  Prosecutors, on the other hand, prefer to 
deport traffickers and prostitutes and focus on measures 
that will prevent their return to the UAE.  This quandary 
between the Ministries of Interior and Justice on how to 
best combat the UAE's human trafficking problem will 
hopefully be resolved once a new anti-TIP law is approved, 
possibly later this year. 
 
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ANITA'S CASE 
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3. (U) On August 30, the UAE press reported on the story of 
a 31-year-old Indian woman who was brought to the UAE under 
false promises of employment, then forced into 
prostitution.  "Anita" claimed an Indian named "Nasser" 
recruited her in March for a Dubai hospital job that would 
pay her more than twice her Indian salary.  She was charged 
the equivalent of ten months of her UAE salary to "process 
travel documents."  Upon reaching Dubai, Anita was 
immediately forced into prostitution.  After about four 
months she was "sold" for about $1,600 and transferred to 
Abu Dhabi.  She escaped a month later during one of the 
regular transfers of women between apartments.  A family 
sheltered her until she was able to get assistance from the 
Indian Consulate. 
 
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POLICE FRUSTRATED THEY CAN'T DO MORE 
------------------------------------ 
 
4. (C) On August 30, Poloff spoke with the Director of the 
Dubai Human Rights Care Department, Lt. Col. Mohammed 
Abdulla Al Murr, about this case.  Al Murr said his 
department was not involved with the case, and expressed 
frustration over the lack of open communications between 
his office and source country embassies and consulates.  He 
said that he and his deputies have met with a number of 
source country missions over the past few months to 
exchange views on the problem of human trafficking, offer 
police assistance with both assisting victims and pursuing 
traffickers, and inform missions that his department has 
branches in every police station in Dubai.  He said he 
provided all missions his department's 24-hour victims' 
hotline phone number and directed them to the Human Rights 
Care Department's website for more information. 
 
5. (C) Al Murr said he was also frustrated with the Dubai 
Public Prosecutor's office, and specifically with policies 
set by Dubai Attorney General Ibrahim Bu Melha.  He said 
that Dubai police regularly arrest traffickers and send 
cases to public prosecutors, only to have the charges 
dropped and traffickers quietly deported without trial or 
publicity.  He said Bu Melha prefers to deport traffickers 
and victims alike, rather than following the better (albeit 
more time- and resource-consuming) law enforcement 
practices that would break the criminal rings.  He said 
that this disconnect has been heating up over the past few 
months. 
 
6. (C) Bu Melha has told us (see reftel) that, in the past, 
Public Prosecution has regularly put both prostitutes and 
traffickers on trial, convicted them, and kept them in jail 
for a short time before "pardoning" and deporting them.  In 
April, Bu Melha again said that the most effective 
punishment was to deport traffickers and ensure that they 
never returned to Dubai.  (Note: Police and MOI officials 
confirmed that, while "repeat offenders" used to be able to 
return to Dubai shortly after deportation, they no longer 
can due to implementation of iris recognition scanning of 
all deportees and "new" visitors from source countries. 
Since scanning began in March 2003, over 11,000 potential 
illegal immigrants have been turned away at the border. End 
Note.)  In his conversations with us earlier this year, Bu 
Melha noted that limited jail space was also an important 
consideration.  Additionally, according to current UAE law, 
prosecutors must treat prostitutes as criminals except when 
coercion could be clearly proven.  Bu Melha said the only 
way around this practice would be to either change UAE law, 
or for his office to institutionalize a "creative approach" 
to prosecuting cases, such as routinely pardoning 
prostitutes prior to their cases coming to court, while 
following through with the trials of their traffickers. 
This way, the victims can go home while their "bosses" do 
jail time in Dubai.  Bu Melha indicated that he would not 
oppose such an approach, but that it would need to be 
coordinated with various Dubai government entities. 
 
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INDIAN CONSULATE COMMENTS 
------------------------- 
 
7. (U) Poloff spoke with K.M. Venugopalan, a vice consul at 
India's Consulate in Dubai, about trafficking trends.  He 
said that the consulate sees cases similar to Anita's 
situation once or twice a month in Dubai, and somewhat less 
frequently in Abu Dhabi.  Many of the victims come from 
India's Kerala state.  The consulate has asked Kerala to 
verify all employment offers made to single women before 
they are allowed to travel to the UAE.  He said traffickers 
employ individuals to act as recruitment agents to identify 
young single women and convince them to accept "job offers" 
with temptingly high salaries.  The agents often use false 
names and prevent victims from learning other identifying 
information so that, if victims do escape, they can offer 
authorities very little information that could lead them to 
their traffickers.  For this reason, Venugopalan said the 
consulate rarely calls the police, since he believes 
victims do not offer enough information about traffickers 
to open an investigation.  Rather, the consulate writes to 
the local police station and MFA after it assists the 
victims.  He said the consulate rarely receives responses 
from the MFA, and on the few occasions that police stations 
have responded, they have done so only after a lapse of 
several months. 
 
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TIP REPORTS INCREASE 
-------------------- 
 
8. (C) Since Anita's story broke, the press has run three 
more stories on women who escaped from prostitution rings, 
and another report of 23 Pakistani boys who were 
repatriated after working in the UAE as camel jockeys.  We 
also learned of similar situations during meetings with the 
Embassy of Nepal in Abu Dhabi and Philippine Consulate in 
Dubai.  All the victims mentioned thought they were coming 
to the UAE for legitimate work, not knowing they would be 
forced into prostitution. 
 
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RECOMMENDATIONS 
--------------- 
 
9. (C) Conflicting approaches between the Ministries of 
Justice and Interior regarding how to handle traffickers 
and their victims may be resolved once new anti-TIP 
legislation is adopted, possibly as early as later this 
year.  Interior has formed a special committee to review 
existing laws related to human trafficking, and Justice 
agreed in February to review an anti-TIP model law provided 
by G/TIP (Interior is reviewing the same text).  Post will 
continue to work closely with the UAEG at all levels to 
encourage passage of the legislation as soon as possible. 
 
10. (U) Action Request:  Post also requests G/TIP and 
NEA/ARPI desk to forward text, preferably in Arabic, of any 
existing anti-trafficking legislation used in other Arabic 
and/or Muslim countries.  Finally, Post will test UAEG 
receptivity to receiving assistance from U.S. trafficking, 
legal and law enforcement experts as it drafts its anti- 
trafficking law.  Involving an outside team of seasoned 
specialists could help the UAE move past its 
Justice/Interior disconnect more quickly, and ensure that 
the UAEG has the legal tool it needs to help combat its 
serious trafficking problem. 
 
SISON 
 
 
 
 
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