Some of the cases were horrific.

"For one year and five months... no salary at all. I asked for money and they would beat me, or cut me with a knife, or burn me," Sri Lankan domestic worker Ponnamma S. was quoted as telling the rights group.

Haima G., a Filipina domestic worker, said her employer called her into his bedroom one day soon after she had arrived and told her she had been "bought" for 10,000 riyals (2,670 dollars).

"The employer raped me many times. I told everything to madam. The whole family, madam, the employer, they didn't want me to go. They locked the doors and gates," she was quoted as saying.

Eventually she escaped to the embassy where she waited nine months for justice, only to be told that the case had been thrown out of court and she would be sent home.

Nour Miyati, an Indonesian domestic worker, had her fingers and toes amputated due to daily beatings and starvation. Charges against her employers were dropped despite a confession after a three-year legal process.

"Employers often take away passports and lock workers in the home, increasing their isolation and risk of psychological, physical, and sexual abuse," HRW said in a statement.

It said Saudi labour laws excluded domestic workers, so many were forced to work 18 hours a day, seven days a week -- often without pay -- for years.

Thousands of domestic workers took shelter each year at the social affairs ministry and their respective embassies. Indonesia, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Nepal accounted for the bulk of the women.

The ministry was supposed to help negotiate payment but it often sent the workers home "empty-handed" because their earnings were used to pay the employers to release them.

"The restrictive kafala (sponsorship) system ties migrant workers' visas to their employers and means employers can deny workers the ability to change jobs or leave the country," HRW said.

HRW's Varia said the government had spent years considering labour reform "without taking any action."

"It's now time to make these changes, which include covering domestic workers under the 2005 Labor Law and changing the kafala system so that workers' visas are no longer tied to their employers," she said.

"The Saudi government should extend Labor Law protections to domestic workers and reform the visa sponsorship system so that women desperate to earn money for their families don't have to gamble with their lives."

More than eight million migrants work in Saudi Arabia, including 1.5 million domestic workers, most of whom send money back home to their families.

Source-AFP
SRM