27 February 2008

Shelters for human trafficking victims in UAE

Shaikh Hamdan affirmed that under the directives of the President, His Highness Shaikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, UAE staunchly supports all international efforts to combat human trafficking through the enactment of laws which control this inhuman form of crime which is considered a scar on the forehead of the entire humanity. He added that UAE is among the first countries who perceived the magnitude of the human misery brought about by this crime, and thus promulgated Federal law No 51 for Year 2006 regarding combating human trafficking. The UAE also set up the national anti-human trafficking committee and formulated a comprehensive national strategy in this regard, Shaikh Hamdan noted.

He stressed that UAE was among the first few nations who called upon the international community and the various world organisations to shoulder the full responsibility of protecting the civilians, especially women and children from the danger of human trafficking operations as well as from war crimes and crimes against humanity.

?On several international occasions UAE continued to call for the world attention to the consequences of the increasing challenges women and children face, as they are the immediate and the largest section uprooted by the crimes against humanity, warfare and other forms of conflicts around the world?, Sheikh Hamdan said.

He said that UAE has shown its moral and humanitarian commitment to the protection of the victims of human trafficking through the ratification of the international conventions in this regard. UAE ratified UN convention on the rights of child in 1997, and signed the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime in 2002. Thus the UAE and its prudent leadership continued to munch support for humanitarian issues to protect the victims of these crimes, noted Sheikh Hamdan.

Poverty, need, unemployment and economic and social destitution are among the factors which lead to the spread of the human trafficking phenomenon among delicate and fragile societies. So, UAE takes up fundamental roles of empowering these sections of the human society by way of making them capable of standing up to the tough situations in life. The country does this though humanitarian and relief operations and development projects to help those societies to stand up again, said Shaikh Hamdan.

All the divine scriptures has dignified the status of human being, and the Almighty Allah honoured the human being above all other creations, and made him his vicegerent on earth to live in accordance with the divine message given for mankind. But what is happening today in our world is the most evident form of the infringement of human dignity through crimes against humanity and violation of human rights. This clearly contradicts with what has been taught by the divine scriptures as well as with all the international conventions and protocols which have been promulgated to protect the human being and alleviate his sufferings, Shaikh Hamdan said.