**IMMEDIATE RELEASE** IMMEDIATE RELEASE**

UAE GOVERNMENT URGED ENFORCE NEW LAW AGAINST CHILD CAMEL JOCKEYS

The Government of the United Arab Emirates has announced that from 31 March 2005, a new law against using children under 16 as camel jockeys will come into force.

Despite the announcement, made ahead of a recent visit to the UAE by a United States free trade delegation* and the upcoming finalisation of the US Trafficking in Persons Report**, Anti-Slavery International continues to receive regular reports of boys as young as four years old being trafficked and exploited as camel jockeys in the Emirates; the most recent eyewitness accounts are from races earlier this month.

Despite the promise of this new law, using child camel jockeys has been illegal in the UAE under various international and domestic laws since 1980.

As recently as 2002, the UAE Government stated it would ensure the implementation of regulations prohibiting the use of children as camel jockeys younger than 15 years old and lighter than 45 kilograms, and the imposition of serious penalties against offenders. Yet the trafficking of boys to the UAE and their use as camel jockeys continued to be widespread. The Government has failed to implement measures to stop it and, to the best of our knowledge, no UAE citizen has faced judicial proceedings for this offence.

"If this latest law against using children as camel jockeys is to have any significance, it must be implemented and all offenders prosecuted. It is vital the UAE Government provides specialist rehabilitative care to all children rescued from this abuse and helps to make such support available in the child's home country," Mary Cunneen Director of Anti-Slavery International said.

Traffickers abduct or lure young boys away from their families in South Asia and Africa with promises of well-paid work, education and training. But in reality, they are kept in brutal conditions, deprived of food and water to keep them light, and subjected to hazardous work; racing as speeds of 40-50 kilometres per hour. Children have been seriously injured and some have died, both as a result of their treatment and from falls during races. Trafficking is the fastest growing form of slavery today.

• *The US trade delegation visited the UAE from 18-24 March to negotiate a free trade agreement. The second round of meetings will be held in Washington DC on 25 April 2005.
  
  
• **The US Government's 2004 Trafficking in Persons Report commended the UAE for its efforts against trafficking - including children as camel jockeys - raising the UAE from Tier 3, reserved for the greatest offenders, to Tier 1 comprising countries whose governments are prohibiting trafficking and punishing acts of trafficking. This was despite the UAE Government's failure to enforce regulations banning the use of children under-15 as camel jockeys.
  
  
• Because using children as camel jockeys is so dangerous, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has repeatedly called for the minimum age for camel jockeys to be 18 years. Furthermore, these children are trafficked to the UAE.
  
  
• Child trafficking is the taking of a child from one place to another for the purpose of exploiting them.
  
  
• Most children used as camel jockeys are aged between four and 10 years old.
  
  
• The use of children as camel jockeys in the UAE has been prohibited since 1980 under:
  
  o UAE Federal Labour Code No. 8 (1980): Section 20 prohibits employment of any child labour under the age of 15.

  o The UAE's independent Camel Jockey Association has had a rule since the early 1990s that using children younger than 14 or lighter than 45 kilograms as camel jockeys is illegal.

  o In 1993 UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan banned the use of children as camel jockeys.

  o In July 2002, Head of the Camel Racing Federation, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Sheikh Hamdan bin Zaid al-Nahyan, announced that from 1 September 2002, using camel jockeys under 15-years-old and those less than 45 kilograms would be banned and offenders punished.

  o The UAE has ratified International Labour Convention No. 138, which specifies minimum age for admission into employment or work is 15. This convention also states, under Article 3, children under 18 should not be engaged in dangerous work -- which camel racing is, as it jeopardises the health and safety of the child.

  o The UAE has ratified International Labour Convention No. 182 against the worst forms of child labour, which prohibits work that is hazardous to the health and welfare of children under 18 years old.

  o Using children as camel jockeys contravenes ILO Convention 29 on forced labour - a core convention.

  o The UAE has also ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which includes the child's right to education, rest and recreation. Child camel jockeys are denied these rights.
  

29 March 2005