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180 Confined Bangaldeshis

Iraqi employer to clear salaries

Staff Correspondent
The Iraqi employer of the 180 Bangladeshi workers who are allegedly confined to their workplace at Najaf in the war-torn country will clear their two months' outstanding salaries in nine days.
Abu Torab Housing Project chairman visited the Bangladesh embassy in Baghdad on Thursday and promised the ambassador to pay the workers' salaries for June and July on August 17 and 24 respectively, said Khondaker Showkat Hossain, expatriates' welfare secretary, yesterday.
The salaries could not be cleared on time as the lack of security was hampering banking in Iraq, he added, quoting Maj Gen Rezanur Rahman Khan, the ambassador.
The employer also said the project would start soon and the workers would be paid all the other outstanding money later.
The Bangladeshi workers have been languishing at the workplace in restive Iraq for over two months.
Under constant watch by security guards of their employer, the expatriates are passing their days at a makeshift house without enough food and water.
Recruiting agency Career Overseas Consultants Ltd had
sent them to that country in late May for working under the project in Najaf.
Recently, they said they feared that their employer would hand them over to a human trafficking group for forced labour.
After several media reported the alleged confinement following protests by their families, the expatriates' welfare and overseas employment ministry asked the embassy in Baghdad to deal with the issue, said the secretary.
Soon after that, an embassy official visited the workplace of the Bangladeshi expatriates on Wednesday and communicated with the Iraq government.
The ministry also asked the recruiting agency to help resolve the issue immediately.
Badrul Amin, managing director of the agency, yesterday told The Daily Star that they had contacted the project authorities and the workers would join work from September.
He said he would ensure the protection of the 180 Bangladeshi nationals in Iraq.
This newspaper could reach neither the ambassador, nor any of the workers in Iraq for more comments yesterday.