Foreign labourers fume over conditions in Dubai

By Fouad Juez

DUBAI (Reuters) - Beyond the gleaming towers, busy highways and luxury villas of Dubai, hundreds of thousands of South Asian labourers who helped build them live in cramped and dusty industrial zones.

Frustrated by low wages and long hours, construction workers in the Gulf Arab trade hub have long complained about the poor working conditions that lie behind Dubai's spectacular building boom. This week, those protests turned violent.

"They turned over police cars, and the police showed up and they created problems with them," said an Egyptian labourer who declined to give his name.

"They are asking for higher wages... They stopped working suddenly. They stopped cars. The police arrived to stop them from closing down the road and (they) assaulted the police. The police besieged the camp, and picked up ... workers and (charged them)."

The Gulf News daily reported on Thursday that of some 5,000 workers were rounded up during the protests on Saturday, some 800 were still in custody. It quoted the police chief, Dahi Khalfan Tamim, as saying that workers involved in vandalising police vehicles and public property would be prosecuted.

Dubai, one of seven emirates in the United Arab Emirates, has long faced criticism from international human rights groups who say it turns a blind eye to the non-payment of wages, lack of medical care and sub-standard housing for workers.

Foreigners, including labourers and middle and high-income executives, comprise over 85 percent of the UAE's 4 million population.

Labourers in coloured overalls can be seen toiling on the construction sites that dot Dubai, which has used cash from record oil prices to build ambitious developments including the world's tallest building and three palm-shaped islands as well as a man-made archipelago shaped like a map of the world.