Jessica Jones, Programs Assistant
With 24 nails and one needle drilled into her hands, legs and forehead, Daneris Ariyawathie made the long journey across the Arabian Sea back to her home in Sri Lanka in early September 
to receive medical attention from the physical abuse she endured on her job. Like many women in Sri Lanki, Daneris sought what she thought to be an auspicious employment opportunity and immigrated to Saudi Arabia in March of 2010 in order to work as a domestic worker. When she complained about her grueling workload, her employers physically reprimanded her, forcing nails and needles, some up to 5cm long, into her body.
While Daneris represents an extreme case, maids, servants and nannys all known categorically around the world as 'domestic workers' - individuals, often women and girls, that work within their employer's household - are often forced to endure extreme and inhumane work conditions. These conditions have been documented in both developed and developing nations. However, it is particularly rampant in the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia and continues to go unnoticed. According to the
Human Rights Watch, "at least one domestic worker died every week in Lebanon between January 2007 and August 2008. Almost half were suicides and many were as a result of falling from high buildings, often while trying to escape their employers." For many domestic workers, a job is not just a portion of their day; this work is often their entire reality. Some are forced to extreme measures as their work conditions become so unbearable and they feel they have no escape.
Domestic workers are an especially vulnerable demographic of the migrant workers population as they
lack the protections that most migrant workers receive under legal provisions such as weekly rest, salaries and health insurance. Employers seeking a domestic worker will sponsor the visa and appropriate paperwork for their domestic worker(s), giving the employer power over their work and immigration status, ultimately, entitling the employer to an unjust sense of ownership. After arriving in their new country, unbeknown, domestic workers are often confined to the house in which they work, sometimes even locked in, and their passports are confiscated. Additionally, because these sponsorship programs are so closely tied to the employers, the domestic workers have little hope for changing their employment status. In fact, in Saudi Arabia, domestic workers are excluded from the protection of labor laws, essentially allowing employers to exert complete control over their domestic workers. In the case of Daneris, Amnesty International had demanded that the Saudi Arabian government investigate this case; however, some evidence demonstrates that it was reported prior to Daneris' departure and the government neglected to move on the issue.
Women like Daneris are not the only victims of domestic labor. Child domestic workers are on the rise throughout the world and this sector of work is the largest employer around the world of girls under the age of 16. There is a lack of legal protection and reluctance to make systematic goals to put such protections in place. In the mean time, thousands of stories like Daneris' are happening to men, women and children as young as 5. To read more about the International Labor Rights Forum’s recommendations for the proposed International Labour Organizations’ Domestic Workers Convention, please visit
here.
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