Helping Camel Jockeys

UAE Has Outlawed Underage Jockeys and Compensated Former Jockeys

Lexington, Ky. - May 9, 2008 - Former camel jockeys from South Asia and Africa are receiving financial support and a wide array of educational and social services under a historic, multi-national program supported by the United Arab Emirates, according to a motion filed today in U.S. District Court in Lexington, Ky., seeking dismissal of a lawsuit filed by American class action lawyers. A similar suit was dismissed last year in U.S. District Court in Miami.

The UAE-UNICEF initiative, described by the U.N. agency as a "model for the region," has eliminated the use of children in camel racing in the UAE and located and repatriated nearly 1,100 former camel jockeys back to their homes in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sudan and Mauritania.

The lawsuit would jeopardize this UAE-supported program, which has set aside more than $11 million since 2005 to compensate the former camel jockeys and provide a network of support to improve their lives and attack the underlying poverty that drove the trafficking and exploitation of children.

By attempting to force a U.S. court to rule on activities that took place thousands of miles away, the plaintiffs are threatening the UAE's successful effort to broker a multinational solution to a serious global problem, according to the motion for dismissal.

"The problems raised in this lawsuit are serious ones, but they are already being dealt with seriously by the nations with the greatest interest in the problem and its solution," stated the legal filing.

The motion noted that the lawsuit doesn't even belong in U.S. Courts since none of the parties reside in the U.S. If successful, this legal action could also undermine relations between the U.S. and the UAE, a longtime ally, the filing stated.

This lawsuit, filed against Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum, the UAE Minister of Finance, is almost identical to a suit brought by the same plaintiffs in Florida in 2006. That lawsuit, which named Sheikh Hamdan and his brother, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, the Prime Minister and Vice President of the UAE and the Ruler of Dubai, was dismissed by a federal judge in July of last year, on the grounds that the case didn't belong in U.S. Court in Miami. The same argument for dismissal applies in Kentucky as well, according to Sheikh Hamdan's lawyers.

Dr. Habib Al Mulla, spokesman Sheik Hamdan, said, "Plaintiffs' lawyers persist in their baseless claims that only distract from the truly important efforts by the UAE to help children. Anyone who honestly reviews the facts will conclude that the remarkable programs created by UNICEF and the UAE are providing benefits to more children, and are doing so faster and with greater certainty, than could any solution mandated by U.S. Courts.

After banning the use of children in camel racing in 2005, the UAE formed a partnership with UNICEF to rescue and repatriate the former child jockeys.

With a $2.8 million grant from the UAE, UNICEF and the governments of the four source countries have set up rehabilitation centers where the former child jockeys can get medical treatment, counseling and financial assistance. Special classes have been established for the former child jockeys, many of whom spoke only Arabic and had never attended school. Teenagers are receiving vocational training, so they can find jobs to replace their lost wages.

By offering a monthly cash grant of about $10 to those who achieved an attendance record of 80%, Pakistani officials have succeeded in enrolling most of the former camel jockeys in school or vocational classes. All of the children received bicycles so they could get to their classes, which may be miles away from their homes.\

In December 2006, the UAE approved initial funding of $30,000,000 AED (approximately $8.2 million) for an expansion of the UNICEF program and signed separate agreements with Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sudan and Mauritania to set up claims facilities to compensate the former camel jockeys.

"They reached out to form innovative partnerships and took bold steps to protect children," Sigma Huda, UN Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, said of the UAE. "Most importantly, the UAE initiative puts children first by providing support to victims of trafficking and exploitation, including towards their reintegration back in their home countries and communities. It's now up to the rest of the world to follow the initiative and example set by the UAE."

The Kentucky lawsuit was filed in September 2007 by Motley-Rice, well-known class action litigators, on behalf of several anonymous former camel jockeys from Pakistan and Bangladesh. The suit asked for class action status to include all former camel jockeys in countries throughout the Gulf region.

The suit was filed under an arcane law, the Alien Tort Statute, which was passed by the First Congress in 1789 and aimed at preventing piracy and assaults on U.S. diplomats abroad. The camel jockey lawsuit seeks an inappropriate application of the statute because it attempts to insinuate U.S. courts into a well-established multilateral process that is successfully combating human trafficking in the UAE and elsewhere in the world, the defendants argued in legal filings.

The U.S. State Department is already a party to that process through its diplomatic efforts to combat human trafficking around the world under the authority of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000.

The U.S. State Department's September 2006 Trafficking In Persons Report states: "[Once] a destination for thousands of young boys trafficked from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sudan and Mauritania to work as camel jockeys, the UAE enacted a law banning the practice in July 2005, and all identified victims were repatriated at the government's expense to their home countries."

The motion for dismissal was supported by declarations from the UAE's Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Mohammed Abdullah Gargawi, stating that the court action could interfere with the invaluable relationship between the U.S. and UAE, and from Colonel Nasser Al Menhalie, director of the Ministry of Interior's Naturalization and Residency Administration, explaining the UAE's multi-pronged effort to ensure the successful repatriation of all the former camel jockeys.

The dismissal motion also noted that the UAE has expressed concerns about the impact of the lawsuit in a diplomatic note to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice.

The attorneys representing the ruling family include Joseph G. Finnerty III of DLA Piper and Phillip Scott of Lexington, Ky.

For more information:

Saylor Company
626-794-8606

Mark Saylor
mark.saylor@saylorcompany.com

Evelyn Iritani
evelyn.iritani@saylorcompany.com