In the Arab-Persian Gulf, “migrant workers are the most affected” by the ongoing war in the region, according to the Indian newspaper The Hindu. As per a tally by The New York Times on March 10, at least twelve foreign workers, including those from Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, have been killed in the region since the start of the war. In these countries, they constitute the highest number of civilian casualties.
The latest example is the death of an Indian sailor in an attack on March 11 on an American tanker south of Basra, Iraq, as reported by The Indian Express. Beyond the Gulf, Mary Ann Velasquez de Vera, a 32-year-old Filipino, died in Israel on March 1 following an Iranian missile attack on Tel Aviv. She was “assisting with dedication to secure her patient,” details the Philippine newspaper Philippines Daily Inquirer.
These examples highlight the significant role of immigrant workers in the Middle East. More than half of the 62 million inhabitants of the six member countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates) are foreign workers – an economically “astounding” dependency, as described by Asia Sen
