Dubai: "The City that Cares"

[Dropp the Pilot]

Those of you trying to make meaningful comparisons between various pilot opportunities might be interested to know what I spent to live in the UAE last year.

Our little family dropped $64,606 US dollars on food, gas, rent, utilities, insurance, car repairs and the other glamorous trappings of the expat lifestyle such as garden hoses and dog food.

That amount does not include any car payment, holidays, major purchases, club memberships or entertaining beyond the occasional movie or takeaway.

That's bare-bones survival, expat style.

[sluggums]

How many kids, any school fees?

[mini cooper]

FO salary approx 18000dhs/month = approx $4900/month

4900 x 12 = $58800 a year = you have to have savings as an FO to survive!!!!!!!!!!

:confused: :confused: :confused:

[MR8]

mini...

Dropp's expenses include rent and utilities, so you have to add the utility allowance, which is about 26.000$ for a F/O if I'm not mistaken (still in company accomodation myself..) So that's a total income of approx $84000, so dropp should have been able to save $20000 in one year..

MR8

[mini cooper]

An FO can save $20,000 a year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry must be dreaming

:confused:

[typhoonpilot]

Dropp brings up a good point. I've always told people when deciding on a job to look at the bottom line. This holds especially true for expat jobs where the same top line can have dramatically different bottom lines depending on the airline/country/location.

That said, Emirates tends to be one of the better ones when it comes to bottom line. No income tax, no rent, no utilities, subsidized schooling, etc. Inflation has certainly eatin into our bottom line over the last few years. That would hold doubly true for those who have taken the housing allowance and are still renting.

Yet, what perplexes me most is that I saw numerous new hire F.O.s go out and buy the 135,000 Dirham car ( with a loan ), brand new plasma screen TV and surround sound stereo system and then they start complaining that they don't have enough money. Well, duh :ugh:


TP

[donpizmeov]

Well the EK pilot pay survey for 2002 shows that a 1st yr EK capts package is about $US 25000 below the average for 1st yr capts of the 46 airlines used. While the Max EK capt Increment is about the max capt average for the same airlines.
For FOs it shows that a 1st years FO package is $US 8000 above the average for 1st year FOs of the same airlines, and that a Max increment EK FO is about $US 3000 below the average.
This Package is inclusive of Net Income, Employee Deductions (ie provident payment, loan payment, healthcare payment etc) and tax and Additional costs of employment (housing, pensions etc.).
When looking at just part of the package, for example Net income and Employee deductions and Tax, the EK 1st year Capt is at less than half of those for CX (old and new schemes), AA, AF, NH, CO, DL, KA, KL, JL, NW, SK, SV, UA. He does however do much better than TG, RJ, MH, AZ.
It shows a total package value for a Max increment EK Capt at $US 210000 (of which $US 140000 would be salary), while a Max increment KA Captian would be on $US 340000 (salary $US175000), a CX B scaler on $US 370000 (salary $US 230000)and a CX A scaler on $US 410000 (salary $US 260000). Average of all airlines was shown, for max increment capt is $US 210000.
For FOs it shows a 1st yr EK FOs package as $US 115000, with a salary of $US 55000.

Don

[MR8]

Dropp...

Are you in company accomodation?? Do you get the utility allowance or are your rent and utility costs for a house elsewhere??
Otherwise, you would have $20000 to spend on luxury items and decent holidays...
You won't get rich of that, but you will survive.. ;)

MR8

[L1011]

Just checked my accounts for 2004.

Family of four, two cars (both paid for, so oldish) in company housing, with Dubai school fees paid. Last year we spent US$ 61,000 on 'just surviving'. :eek:

Holidays (long summer one for family) and the end of year Xmas bash not included. No boat, golf/sailing club memberships or any other toys. No full time househelp either, itinerant gardner cum car-washer only. Most wine and beer bought on layovers so that came off the allowances.

Not bad, not good either. If you move here obviously a lot more needed. Saved a bit, but it was not easy.

[fractional]

Not being the ideal, the EK package is "at the end of the day" still much better than anyone else in the region.
Even considering T&Cs have changed recently, you still have people who have learnt from their previous mistakes or strill preserve some "sights and sounds" of the airline EK was few years ago. I know nothing is perfect, but at least you have better people looking after you rather than other airline where the guys dealing with flight ops staff in general and pilots in particular don't have a clue about one's rights. Ask the guys down south.
Unless political forces have an "act" EK will be able to react in time to keep "the planes flying". This is a view from very far.
Keep flying safe.

[White Knight]

L1011 - what the :mad: did you spend $usd 61,000 on??????????

If you live on caviar and employ 5 maids maybe I could understand that!! You obviously don't know what SURVIVING is all about...............................:yuk:

[nixisfix]

white knight

you obviously don't know why we are expats. If you are here because you just want to survive then I pity you, most of us expect a bit more. I believe even you will agree that living in Dubai has become very expensive, wages are effectively going backwards while the newspapers can't keep up with the good news of record profits, record sales, record visitor numbers and so on. No wonder the thin middle class feels unfairly squeezed, not even mentioning the worker-ants who actually build Dubai, a lot of them even doing it for free...
I have never seen nor imagined a more divided, artificial society, where the veneer of "decency" is so thin that the most casual glance through the newspaper will freak out the average reader in a western country, BUT throw enough money at people and the most appalling conditions become acceptable (Saudia being a good example). In lieu of money, lifestyle is often quoted for a reason to come to Dubai. Poor guys who base their decission on phantasy ads, depicting a "palatial life style" which in reality will pretty soon consist of life in high-rise buildings without view, traffic jams to rival the worst of Europe or the US and an environment that 6 months in a year could be used to train astronauts for a mission to Mars.
If the money is not right, small problems start to grow very big, very fast.

[White Knight]

nixisfix - you misread what I'm saying. I'm certainly here to do more than "survive"!!
I just can't for the life of me see how $61,000 is bare bones scraping through "just surviving":confused: :rolleyes:

[Trashed Aviator]

Well if you have kids especially 3 or more you will never save a thing, and never afford a maid.
F/Os are garbage in this company , not even in the same league as a captain and not worthy of a command ,its like the 2 jobs are not related.

:*

[BYMONEK]

Trashey

Sounds like you have some serious issues. If I was THAT bitter about my employer, I wouldn't be hanging around mate. With an attitude like that, you'll never know what it's like as a Captain here.

[wastafarian]

nixisfix, all great points but that is the problem with places that everyone wants to go to. I understand places like Miami, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Puerto Vallarta all used to be sleepy, attractive and affordable places for middle income families decades ago. If everyone wants to be there, the magic wears off after a while.

[Ghostflyer]

I think the numbers are about right, I didn't do the survival thing as an F/O just added the ex-pat bits to my UK life. When I first arrived, bought a second hand car for 95k, got a maid and went to work. 2 kids, a holiday/year (home not abroad) and went out to do Dubai. i.e Couple of times/month had a nice meal with friends in a swish restaurant, had family and friends over to stay, and a club membership. Over 3 years, I was a nett contributor to Dubai of over US$50,000.

I was debt free on arrival and this year finally hope to clear up the F/O debts. Don, my bottom line was that I had a maid and twice a month went to nicer restaurants than I would have frequented in the UK. Other than that my lifestyle was the same. Played with the kids, played golf etc. The staples of my life are more expensive here than they were in the UK and I didn't want to change them.

Had Dubai put into perspective the other day. Was out playing golf with a Kiwi passing thru to the UK to see his new outlaws. He said 'what is there to do in Dubai?' I said 'well obviously golf, the rugby 7s and the beach and grrreat hospitality and uh, uh, shopping!' Now I realise how much my actually limited life cost me..but..at least its sunny!

Ghost

[SecurID]

But what if you don't play golf...?

Whilst talking to some crew on a recent layover, a British girl, who has only been here two months, asked 'what is there to do?' So after the obvious answers, I struggled to find something to add to the list already mentioned by Ghostie. I hadn't really thought about it before...

[Fart Master]

Once you boil it down, the only thing here is the sunshine:yuk:

[Zones]

i'm non-pilot, but been looking at the nos and have managed to work outthe following:

All figures Dhs per annum:

rent 125k
school for 1 young kid 30k
petrol 3.6k
car loan 18k
utilities 12k
medical/dental ins 18k
club membership 15k
maid 25k
Sat TV 3k
Internet 3k
Basic home food 25k

total: 277.6k

or GBP 41,640 / USD 77,034

Obviously all above figures are generalisations, rent can be lower if you want, you don't HAVE to have a maid, you can buy a cheap old car etc etc... take some of these out or down a bit and you get to about USD 60k which seems to agree with previous numbers submitted by other posteurs...

Can anyone corroborate these figures?

Thks

[jetupset]

My Actual Figures are:

1> Rent 75k
2> No Kids School ('cause I've got no kids)
3> Petrol 5k (2 cars >5 litres ea)
4> Car Loan 30k
5> Utilities 9k
6> Medical/Dental 0 (employer provided)
7> Club Membersip 0 (ok, I'm a boring fart - but I get one club membership free)
8> Maid 5k (part time)
9> Sat TV (0)
10> Internet 3k
11> Basic Home Food 25k
12> Other 25k (occasional nights out, MMI, etc etc)

Total 177 = US$48.4k

It looks cheaper than many estimates here, but it has to be.....

[in limbo]

I have noticed in a couple of these posts about the cost of internet.
Is it 3 thousand USD per year?
Holy crap that seems high!:ugh:

[Fart Master]

Yeah, just like Zones 125,000 USD rent per year. Sorry had to have a small jab. Seriously tho it's all in UAE dirhams $1=3.678Dhs:ok:

[AMX10]

Being still sound of mind and not so of body I hereby legate the followwing:

20 years spent in the UAE for nothing, shawarmas were 1 a piece now converge around 5 see 10.

To Dubai, you look nice and modern but hey where is the city center, where is life? And what are you all about, people running faster by the day after the same coin, knowing only one will get it and ending up borrowing to pretend that they have it.

The legacy of wanting to be a modern day city with an economy akin to the US where on average only 2 1/2 % of citizens have any savings in the banks and everyone is living off a mortgage.

A local community with no character no history and no traditions that can reflect any culture. Sorry but show me a local and ask him who he is? Few if any know where their family originated. Now add to that the pommy comedian like the trutches of this world and you have a circus, and that is what dubai is.

School fees not far off from the marks of IVY league institutions, childrens tuitions fees near 30000 dhs a year....and for what?
Cars, insurance, radar tickets, a wave to a friend costs 200 dhs, shaking someone's hand is 500.

Companies that do not pay wages, bills, salaries, coolies working under the sun at midday without a break for 12 hours, all in the name of modernism.....? Ah all this suffering and no one budges yet we live with it. Jumeirah Jains and Janes where are those bottles of water that you promised? Or has the task gotten too big for you, or was it just another media prank thought off while you were at the shade of your RRover A/C full on at the intersection of wasl and Def R/A eyes darting under your cool shades (gucci or prada)

Dubai everywhere on TV, adverts in major press and media, the bburj everyone on a visit wants to see and take pictures of?
The hookers on sheikh Z road, oh yes Dubai!

So where is the lodge? Where is everyone, Stan and the lot, the smiley faces of the ski club and intercont pub, now that was dubai and then even the cost of a pint didn't matter because we enjoyed it!

I leave to Dubai and everyone there the cold in the heat, the natureless character of the expact, the CID everywhere in your life like sand after a visit to the desert, the heads without faces the lack of personality of the airline crew, the indians running the show, the arabs pissed off, the english who rule, the OZs and their drawl mate! the Africaners who have all of a sudden become civilised and talk like nazis of the holocaust of apppartheid as though it was not theirs. I leave everything and I am happy.

I am home, got a job and still have the t-shirt, all I miss is something Dubai does not offer anymore, comfort and peace and I have that here in good old Manchester!

[Payscale]

Gee Trashed Aviator, I feel so bad for you now.....nobody likes you! But since you can write I assume you can read, and my contract clearly spelled out the salary details. You could alway leave..it only a phone call away!

[Trashed Aviator]

Yep your right ,back home for Xmas !

I tried to hang in there.............:{

[ruserious]

Good luck to you Trashy, hope things work out better in civilisation.

Payscale, you do talk cr*p. My contract has been so abused so often, I am thinking of trying to sue Jacko

If you think managements responsibilities end with what is written on our ephemeral contracts, then you are as deluded as only a very deluded person could be.

[Ghostflyer]

Ruserious,

You missed 'in deluded land'

Ghost:ok:

[TE RANGI]

Interesting thread. This is Pprune at its best. What better use to it than to compare incomes/expenses/lifestyles from those in our trade around the world?

Generally speaking, the more attractive (for whatever reason) a place is, the more expensive it tends to be. It is no surprise that prices in DXB have skyrocketed (and will probably continue to do so). This is indicative of its powerful allure to many people.

While salaries may not have matched the real inflation (they seldom do), this is only a reflection of Dubai's maturity as a place of residence. It is obvious that the highest income/expense differentials tend to be in the least developed locales, if you're willing to put up with the discomfort. There's no free lunch.

(Most) pilots still enjoy their profession, and that is a (no small)reward in itself. The degree of satisfaction with your campany, aircraft, routes, roster etc should also be brought into the equation.

Just as a comparison: I'm based in PMI, which is nice, but not cheap. My (two people) expenses in 2004 were to the tune of
€ 78000 = U$ 94000 (discounting car and mortgage).

Happy ldgs.

[Payscale]

Well ruserious, good luck to you if you are sueing them. Dont expect to stay for long.
When I signed my contract I knew is was not worth the paper it was written on, but hey, I could always leave. So can you. Not much else you can do actually.

Agree or not with management. Doesnt really matter, since there is zero communication. If you have a complaint you will be stopped at the door by a stubbord secretary from the subcontinent, that feels its her airline... So what is it worth? It is what you make of it....

Best thing is not having to live in their building. After work I go home and dont see EK before the next flight. Gives a nice distance, so that I can smile next time I jet off.

So, dude, chill out, dont judge me, fly you roster, collect you money and I am sure you will see it from a brighter side.......if not....you can always leave..:8

[AMX10]

KunnDize;

Let s see how you feel after 5 years and start another post, not bitter, just better.

Indians here are different and since they are truly part of the scene they do not behave like the majority do in Dubai.

Ta.

[ruserious]

Ghosty,
thanks for the proof read

After reading Payscales last post he is definately, as deluded as only a very deluded person, in deluded land can be. :D

[145qrh]

Did I read correctly in todays paper that all cars built before 2000.ie more than 5 years old will not be able to be registered in Dubai ????or other GCC states......seems a bit extreme.....

[BigGeordie]

145qrh, it's only a proposal at the moment. Interesting way to solve the traffic problems in Dubai however!:}

[Believe Brother]

.....and keep the money going into the pockets of the 'chosen' families who own the car dealership franchises.

[AMX10]

Having had the pleasure of flying with HH a few years ago, he made it clear in the flight deck on the way back from one of his European journeys that Dubai will make its money from the expacts currently accomoddated there and the ones to join.

So its no surprise to me that all these matters are being discussed now. It's like a trap that has just closed up. For those with families it si not about the sticker price anymore, but rather more about the convenience of having to move again, finding schools etc....

And ...... its not going to get cheaper!!!

[Left Coaster]

Saw the "older" car deal too, what a place! But what really amused me was the "Stewardess" who lives in Dubai and works for a major airline who became pregnant "out of wedlock" and faces a 6 month jail term unless she can prove she is married to an employee of the same airline...but why does she face jail and not the "father?"
Same story again ladies and gents...try not to dip your pen in the company ink, it usually spills and causes trouble. By the way can anyone tell me which century we live in?:confused:

[heywood u bleume]

According to the top right corner of today's Gulf News front page the year, (in local terms anyway), is 1426. That would appear appropriate.

HUB:bored:

[jetupset]

If what I hear is correct the stewardess concerned collapsted on an outbound flight. Since we know what the attitude of the authorities is towards this, why did the girl come back, and was she advised what might happen?

[Believe Brother]

Doesn't Dubai beak off about being 'The City that Cares'. So why would she expect to get imprisoned for being pregnant, upon her return. I just hope Amnesty gets ahold of this one.

[jetupset]

Quote: "why would she expect to get imprisoned for being pregnant"

Because it is not an uncommon occurrence. Observe the reality, don't listen to the PR. It is less dissapointing that way.

[Trashed Aviator]

Because a local ****** her and they cant do anything to him....:mad:

[AMX10]

Welcome to Dubai~!!!!!:ouch:

Had he been an expat he would have been hauled in to VP sec without any delay and probably questionned at gunpoint!

[Dune]

In an effort to educate those who might be considering Emirates/Dubai, I think it might be appropriate to provide information on the city they are considering staking their futures in.
Anyone who comes across articles which might be appropriate to educate the masses please feel free to add them.
Here is the first. Background info is the girl in question was a new Emirates flight attendant and the two groups worked together (one in a Toyota Land Cruiser, one in a Hummer). Welcome to justice Dubai style.
Rape case verdict
Monday, 20 February 2006
The victim of a gang rape stormed out of a Dubai courtroom yesterday after hearing that two of the six defendants on trial for the assault were found not guilty because of insufficient evidence.
Four others, aged between 19 and 21, including two brothers, were sentenced to two years in prison each by the Dubai court of first instance for the attack, last September, on a 23-year-old British woman.
The court also awarded the victim temporary damages of dhs10,000 plus legal costs. The public prosecutor will appeal the judgement, looking for a tougher sentence.
The victim's lawyer, Hamdan Al Harmi, yesterday expressed his client's anger over the acquittal of the two defendants but said they will now file a civil action for further damages.
Medical evidence during the trial showed that the victim had sustained undisclosed injuries resulting from the rape which took place in a remote part of the desert, near the Ras Al Khaimah road.
The victim had accepted the offer of a lift home from the group of young men in Jumeirah after being intimidated by another group of youths. However, the two gangs were working together and instead the woman was driven to the desert where the men took turns in raping her in the car.
The gang later drove her back and dropped her off at Al Mullah Plaza and the victim alerted the police.
A taxi driver was able to provide police with a description the suspects' vehicle descriptions, leading to the gang's arrest within the same day. Four were held without bail in the lead up to the trial.
Wonder what the sentence would have been had it been 6 Indians and a local UAE Muslim girl; I suspect significantly more than 2 years.
This is the place you will bring your wife and daughters and it is getting worse. Just a heads up.

[Dune]

Once you have your wife in Dubai, you'll have to let her drive. Make sure to buy something with lots of metal and plenty of airbags. 2.9 mm of rain + these idiots = 500 accidents in 3 hours; welcome to "paradise".
Season's first rain in Dubai, N. Emirates
By a staff reporter
22 February 2006
DUBAI — Dubai and the Northern Emirates experienced the season's first rainfall early morning yesterday.
The showers which soon turned into a drizzle in most parts of the emirates caused traffic snarls during the morning rush hours, throwing the road network, especially in Sharjah, in disarray.
According to the Meteorological Office in Sharjah, just over three millimetre of rains were recorded in the emirate, but puddles were evident till late evening on the streets. The traffic condition on the inter-emirate highways connecting Dubai and the Northern Emirates was so bad that it took motorists from Sharjah over three hours just to reach Al Qusais in Dubai. Even office-goers within Sharjah were delayed by over an hour. The snarls further worsened due to a number of minor accidents in different parts of the emirate. Dubai's road network also suffered from the showers, but the congestion was tackled more quickly.
The wet weather is likely to persist through the week, with a distinct chance of showers today and tomorrow, according to the Weather Office in Dubai.
The mercury also dipped slightly, down to a minimum of 16 degrees Celsius last night, and a maximum of 24 degrees expected in the day today. The weather will be settled today with light breeze and patches of cloud, and a chance of showers or drizzle in some places. The cloudy weather is expected to prevail till Saturday, according to the weathermen.
Flight information desks at the Dubai International Airport and the Sharjah International Airport reported normal operations and scheduling of all flights, both incoming and outgoing, despite the rainy weather condition yesterday.
Meanwhile, the Control Room of the Dubai Police received between dawn until 9am reports of around 500 traffic accidents caused due to speeding and poor visibility due to the rains. About seven vehicles reportedly collided on Shaikh Zayed road on the way to Abu Dhabi at 6am. Two persons suffered moderate injuries and were transferred to Rashid Hospital.
Similar accidents took place at Al Shindagha Tunnel involving a pile-up of nine cars, while another accident involving seven vehicles collided but no casualties reported. An accident also took place on Al Khail Road when the driver lost control over his speeding vehicle and overturned. He suffered from minor injuries and was transferred to the hospital for medical treatment.
Brigadier Mohamed Saif Al Zafin, Director of General Department of Traffic, called upon motorists to comply by safety measures during rain or fog or sandstorm which can cause low visibility and to take all precautionary measures during weather change even if the roads were empty.

[4PW's]

Best career move I have ever made was rejecting an invitation to come over for a DEC interview with EK, and that when desperate for a replacement job to the crap one I had.

Having gone into and out of Dubai for the last 12 years, I am not surprised to read of this latest travesty of justice. As it happens, I was laying over in Dubai when this article was printed in the local paper.

The sad affair brings to mind a story a local EK engineer told me over lunch. It was the last time I spoke to the mongrel.

He and his brothers regularly engaged in such activities as described in the article.

He bragged how this was 'always with white flight attendants', who presumably relaxed their guard when in his otherwise charming company during an aircraft dispatch or turn-around.

Inviting them out, he and his brothers would rape and molest the girls, whom they had often drugged.

The brothers were never been caught. On the one occassion a complaint was made, the police did begin an investigation. But 'the boys' strenuously denied everything. And being such outstanding individuals, read locals, nothing further was said or acted upon.

Lovely place, the Middle East.

Lovely place.

[Andu]

One part of me is utterly outraged by the rape case results, and sadly, the other part is not at all surprised.

Another snippet of news on the radio yesterday: Dubai has averaged one death on the roads every day since the New Year. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that that was just on Shk Z Rd.

[naughty but nice]

All thoughts to the victim, but am I the only one to think why the hell did she even get into a car with these guys??

Ok they should never have done what they did, but theres 2 sides to every story and maybe she led them to believe she was an easy western girl by even accepting the lift with strangers in the first place.

I mean come on..does she normally do this kind of thing in the UK? accepting lifts from total strangers at night?

If she thought she was in that much danger while waiting for a cab she should have gone back to the hotel..

[Funk]

All thoughts to the victim, but am I the only one to think why the hell did she even get into a car with these guys??

Ok they should never have done what they did, but theres 2 sides to every story and maybe she led them to believe she was an easy western girl by even accepting the lift with strangers in the first place.

I mean come on..does she normally do this kind of thing in the UK? accepting lifts from total strangers at night?

If she thought she was in that much danger while waiting for a cab she should have gone back to the hotel..

u r a ********..."girl i don't know gets into my so i have the right to rape and beat her" give me a ******* break!

[mensaboy]

You've got to be kidding naughty. I don't think its very wise of you to try to wind people up with a post like that, over an issue such as this one.

If you are indeed being serious with that post, then you are only a slightly better human being that those animals mentioned in this thread.

[03Rnow30R]

The rape mentioned is terrible and I agree the "penalty" given is ridiculous.

I do however feel much more relaxed leaving my wife alone at home here in Dubai while I am on a nightshift, than I ever did leaving her at home alone in South Africa. She didn't sleep at all and sat with my pistol in her lap and the armed reaction panic alarm next to her till I got home. Many of my friends have been hi-jacked at gun point and attacked in there own homes. My wife and I too were victims of crime, as I am sure, were many others out here. These things here are at least in the news (censored, I agree). A policeman being killed back home might make it to page six, if that!

Mix up different nationalities anywhere, and crime will poke it's ugly head out some time. Would you like to cross paths with the cops out here? I wouldn't.

Yes there is crime here and I agree the justice is not fair at all. But when you look at it in relation to many other places, it could be far worse.

[vbalasu]

in regards to the rape case,,,first of all who the hell would go alone to madinat jumeirah,the girl was probably drunk out of her mind when she went partying at trilogy,,second of all who would get into a land cruiser at 3:30 in the morn with 4 guyz..

jeezz,,stop with the nonsense..shez the person who has to be blamed..

there are better things to be discussed at this forum..

[bravothree]

Did somebody say calling Dubai Taxis are toll-free wherever you are?
And did somebody say the taxis are equiped with GPS whatnots that their own dispatch use to direct them wherever customers call?
And did somebody say the taxis accept credit cards in case you've run out of cash?
And did someone say taxis are aplenty around that area irrespective of the time?
And did somebody say the fare from Madinat to the crew quarters on SZR would not have cost more than Dhs 30? (assuming that is where she resides)

Those questions aside, we've only read of her ordeal through the DXB newspapers.Let's wait for her to tell it the way it was once she gets back home.
Hearts out for her: the guys should have been punished severely!!!!

[Andu]

The '7 days' report said she got into the Land Cruiser after the occupants 'rescued' her from a group of young locals in a Hummer who were harrassing her. But, you guessed it, the two groups were working together and took her out into the desert and the six of them repeatedly gang raped her before dropping her off at a shopping centre in Deira. She was 23 yo Flight Attendant and very new to DXB, probably still in the "MMID" phase.

The incident bears some resemblance to what the young lads of a similar background have been doing in Sydney for years now.

They were identified by a cab driver who witnessed the harrassment and rescue. Two got off for lack of evidence and the other four got two years. It would be interesting to see what the sentences would have been had the nationalities and genders been reversed. Not that any National woman would ever allow herself to be in such a situation.

[BYMONEK]

vbalasu

If you don't want to discuss the topic on this forum then p**s off. That was your first post, at least under that name and I hope it's your last. Yes, this is a forum for differing opinions but to condone the rape by a gang of animals because the girl was drunk shows you to be no better than the perpetrators of the crime.

People with scewed ideas on life would do well to apply for a job in the Dubai Judicial service. You sound like the ideal candidate you tosser :mad:

[readytocopy]

Guys I know we are all professionals here....and I should not swear...but today is an exception....Vbalasu, you are an IDIOT and a pathetic ass and a person that does not care for humanity. One day it will be your daughter out there and the joke will be on you.

[Outta Heresoon]

Naughty But Nice you are an idiot.Even the papers provide more detail than you seem to know given you have already blamed (at least partially) the girl for the offence.In a civilised world such as we purportably live in, RAPE by any guise is a VERY SERIOUS offense regardless how intoxicated or not the VICTIM was, and it would seem this was not a simple matter of taking advantage of a "non street wise" foreign girl.

Vblasu you are the KING of SCUM.If you are trully a Canadian, I can see why you are in the Middle east now. You obviously don't fit in there. Viewpoints like those are not shared with the community, nor with the judicial system.

For locals to get 2 years jail time in this case,there must have been compelling evidence to incriminate, or they would have walked. I believe 2 years for a "guilty" verdict under the circumstances is much too lenient, but that is a personal opinion. Put your daughter or wife in the victim's role and see how your perspective is.

We see petty thieves of foreign persuasion get 4 years+ for less than Dhs 500 worth of merchandise!

The concept of 2 separate judicial systems (at least with regards to incrimination and sentencing) is very much alive here.In another Rape case a man was sentenced to less than 6 months because his 2 separate victims took a month to come forward due to fear and ignorance of the judicial system here. The judge found him guilty "without doubt" but reduced his sentence because the girls took "excessive" time comming forward. Developed countries usually have a limitations statute running for may years if not indefinately for heinous crimes such as rape.

Yet another was given 2 years for stealing a Porche Cayenne and kidnapping a 13 year old, raping her repeatedly at a farm near Hatta. When the authorities caught up with him 2 days later, he rammed the patrol vehicles in his attempt to flee, writing off 3 of the vehicles.
Funny how other Muslim countries reward Rapists with the death penalty, but here 2 years (at least for a national) seems to fit the bill... but again only if there is overwhelming evidence!

Speaking with the police recently the number of residential breakins are on the rise exponentially. There is also many more reports of home invasions but these generally do not make it to the press.
I'm afraid like any big urban area there are problems, but the idea of Dubai being free of "serious" crime are days of the past. Most just don't make it to the press either intentionally or otherwise.

Till now I've only touched on some of the examples of "criminal" mis- justice, but the stories of "civil" cases abound as well. Ask many whom have been involved in property aquisition in Dubai. Very few will tell an unblemished story. (although if you have "found money "to speculate, in the past some have found it fruitful -don't want to be entirely negative here:) ) Everything from being involved in a traffic accident (neglegent is really more the term), to contesting unfair billing/treatment and lack of consumer rights brings with it many more obstacles than many developed countires.

For those contemplating a move here, if you really must leave your "civilized" environment to come here, put your egos aside for a short bit, research and find out what you are really bringing your family into.
Also, as many of the "happy lot" point out, you can try it and if you don't like it you can always leave... (goes for management's prime motto at EK too!), but it's akin to the Eagles song "Hotel California". Anything short of a "runner" within several years (read 3-7) of joining is a very arduous and expensive process negating the whole reason for comming (unless you are really tired of cold, rain and overcast sky), and with that also brings obvious consequences.

[Jack D]

Alternatively you could apply to CX with a basing in MEL or SYD , (see Flt Intnl website) could be attractive to some , leaving early is not that arduous and preferable to slowly getting bitter and twisted .

As for the shamefully lenient sentence imposed on the rapists ,they were found guilty , the act involved abduction , tantamount to kidnapping with the
intent to commit sexual assault ,followed by an actual assault; a very serious crime indeed with a penalty in the region of 10-15 yrs in Europe and life imprisonment in Texas , as for Saudi well that,s been mentioned.

Sometimes this blatant "dual" legal system , civil or criminal, will be the final straw to those who were not that content at EK, after all just walking away is the only form of protest available which is frustrating to say the least.

[longsleep]

All thoughts to the victim, but am I the only one to think why the hell did she even get into a car with these guys??
Ok they should never have done what they did, but theres 2 sides to every story and maybe she led them to believe she was an easy western girl by even accepting the lift with strangers in the first place.
I mean come on..does she normally do this kind of thing in the UK? accepting lifts from total strangers at night?
If she thought she was in that much danger while waiting for a cab she should have gone back to the hotel..

Naughty I asume that you're a pilot being on pprune and you and I know that when you say: "If I had done that...." you're too late, wether you were drunk or sober that doesn't matter. And people (men) shouldn't do the things they did, but................
The people reacting in this thread and judging a country just by hearsay or actual living there and not agreeing: WAKE UP
Isn't the same thing going on in your own countries but less obvious?
And is the story completely true? I've seen circuimstances which could have ended in the same rumour/story/verdict/etc as this, fortunately I and my collaegues haven't

[Flyer1015]

I can't believe people are actually blaming the rape victim.


It's so easy to blame the poor girl, isn't it ?


How about this, why not blame those 4 men in the Land Cruiser?

They're probably butt ugly, could never get laid on their own, and the only way to get some action is to either pay a hooker, or rape someone. Paying a hooker is too expensive for those butt-ugly men, so they steal a date rape drug like GHB, and then they decide to rape.
They're horny, desperate, and "looking for some action."

In no way are their actions justified. It's truly pathetic of them to do what they did.

They're pathetic scumbag.

Our laws in the USA would have tore these guys a new one! They'd been locked away for good (a very long time at least, much greater than 2 years). And on top of that, we got Nance Grace on CNN to b*tch on how these men are monsters, and deserve the death penalty.

[SKELLYTOR]

hmmm, sounds like a very similiar incident that happened to a male cabin crew from qr.
apparently he accepted a ride from 2 locals in doha one night as there was no cabs available.
they brought him to a nearby desert, took turns to rape him then stole his belongings. they then dropped him off to a nearby street and sped off.
however unlike the british girl, the culprits were never caught and the qr management fired him as soon as they heard the news.
the management even advised him against reporting the matter to the police!
sounds like incidents like this are not uncommon in the GCC states...

[Dct no speed]

Rapist should be hanged in public for all to see! If you are a not the death penalty type, sorry for you!
Did this girl deserve it? No!Is 2 years enough? No!

Is Dubai the worst place in the world? No!

I agree that it is not the safe place it use to be but let me say this: Crime is everywhere and judgements not always what it should be.

I'll give you an idea of how easy it is to miss the big picture.400 soldiers die in Iraq in a war zone! Bad ?Yes. Make front pages news all over the world! 21 000 people die in crime related incidents in South Africa.The proudly South African Campain advertise South Africa as a safe place a "great place for a family holidy"Did this make the front page?No!

Her Majesty's country.Girls get raped outside nightclubs, gangs of young kids go out at night (some only 13) and beat up and even kill defenseless people.They record this on their phones and brag about it or put it on web pages.

School kids take guns to school in Canada and shoot teachers and kids.

I need not mention America as we all know how much fun it is travelling in this newest of police states in the world!

What's my point:Judge for yourself if the "City that cares" is the only place in the world that has crime.If you don't like it here I feel sorry for you. Is it your place to run a city down because you are not happy? I don't know?
Some of us are here because it is a better place than our own countries.Some of us are here because we have fled for our lives.
If you have never lived in fear you will never understand it.
No one has shot anyone here, just to take their phone.People don't break into your house and rape your 3 year old baby and wive, kill the father and then steal only the VCR and Tv!
I dont see people Hi-Jacked at gunpoint shot and killed. Policeman don't get killed by people with road rage! Babies don't get raped because someone told them it will prevent AIDS.Farmers don't get killed or chased of their land by 21 year old "War Veterans"(By the way where was the USA,England,Australia,New Zeeland and Canada when that happend? Oh sorry no Oil in Zim! I forgot)

Is Dubai crime free? No!
Do people drive like idiots?Yes!
Is it only locals?No!
Strange how you get cut of in traffic or flashed or see cars parked on the Disabled parking with a SA,Canadia,New Zeeland,Australian,GB or Swedes wheel covers or flags on the back!

Please as the Good Book say: Let he who have no sin cast the first stone

[Outta Heresoon]

All good posts gentlemen.

If i may postulate...I can totally understand the plight of those from SA and various other areas of the world with runaway crime and human rights violations.

I have yet to hear, however, of anyone from the UK, continental Europe, Austrailia, or North America comming to Dubai to escape the ravages of crime.

No Country is perfect. No society is crime free, but for those contemplating a move here, it's only a "heads up" that due to the massive changes in the UAE, and with it's inherent judicial and law enforcement system, that we are bound to see some profound changes in some of the lesser spoken about "Dark sides" here.

Much of the crime anywhere can be linked with the percieved disparity between the "have's" and "have-nots", and the culture of tollerance within the country.
--not accounting for the instability of some individuals concerned of course.

[1972]

To all of you smug muppets speculating about what happened, why it happened and if it happened, do any of you have daughters? Probably not. You wouldn’t have it in you. But if you did, and your daughter experienced a similar incident, would you be making these ridiculous comments? Of course not. Grow up and/or grow a brain.

there are better things to be discussed at this forum.

Gutter language intended as a wind-up removed. Sure it's OK to get wound up '72; this is a serious issue but consider the fact that young people read these forums. Do you want them to be reading this language? 4HP

[SKELLYTOR]

1972,
.......... a little too harsh, don't you think??

[1972]

No, the guy is an idiot and is here purely to kick up a stink. Treat him with the contempt he deserves.

[BigGeordie]

1972, I don't have a daughter and I don't pretend to know all the facts of the case, just what I have read here and in the papers:hmm: However, if I did have a daughter I would hope she would have more sense than to get into any kind of car with a group of strange men at any time of day or night. There are plenty of cabs in Dubai. You wouldn't dream of doing it in the UK, America or Australia so why should it be okay in Dubai?

Having said that, 2 years is obviously nowhere near enough for a crime like that.

[sdcycles]

I wanted to add some Heads Up info to the thread but the 7 Days website 'Letters to the editor ' section is currently unavailable. Perhaps the internet connection is better outside Dubai. Maybe 'first world' people here are trying to vent their anger at the 'third world' rape case verdict. Who knows. Website is:
www.7DAYS.ae (http://www.7DAYS.ae)
It's popular read with expats.

Of interest if you are thinking of "Buying into the Dream" are the
Letters to the Ed, or Most read articles. Do a search.
Building a road through Emirates Hills will get a result. Date recent.
'Loss of second hand market drivers up rents' Wednesday 22/02/06
(their spelling mistake) By Abdul Mohamid, Dubai
'Shattered Dreams' Wednesday 09/11/05
'Should a two million dirham villa look like this?' Wednesday 09/11/05

The veneer of civilisation is very thin in this region. People either accept it as part of the deal or pretend it's not there. Presumably they work on the basis that it'll never happen to them. Good luck.

I'm wondering what I'm doing here now. It's a huge construction site from the airport to where I live, traffic journeys into town are a nightmare and someone has a good bash at maiming or killing me on my bike every other day. This is my last summer unless there is a catastrophe or I get nailed on the SZH. Still some good bits but time to go. A judgement like the above will help some make their minds up.

Naughty but pretty dim for sure.
vbalasu. Your comments made my first world skin crawl. It would probably be better to stay under your rock for awhile. At least until you slough another skin chap.

[Scudsy]

MY GOD some of these posts are unbelievably stupid and misogynous.
I've been to the Madinat and to Trilogy and it's just another club. ITS NOT in a dodgy area, it's a very safe area (or one would believe so until this story was released). It's a tourist area with the best hotels in all of Dubai and the 7 star Burg Al Arab overlooking it. Jumeira is possibly the smartest part of Dubai.
What in heavens name is making some of you dickheads think that she was IN ANY WAY "asking for it" or acting stupidly. You must be wind up merchants OR terminally STUPID.
:mad: Idiots the lot of you.
FACTS:
The Gang worked from 2 cars. One group scared the girl witless and the other group played "nice guys" and offered her a lift away from a frightening situation when no taxis were close by to escape in. Any man could chose that option and not be accused of making a stupid choice.
If my daughter made that choice would I think her unwise? NO.
Would I think that a woman aged in her twenties should have to avoid this area? NO.
Women have the right to flirt with men.
Women have the right to get drunk,
Women have the right to GET LAID,
They NEVER "deserve" to be GANG raped after a night out!
She DID NOTHING WRONG
ABSOLUTELY NOTHING
Anybody thinking otherwise is a complete Neanderthal and doesn’t have the intelligence to be anywhere the controls of an aircraft. A bunch of losers are making some very dumb comments on this thread.

[Dubai Expat]

This is my first post here and sadly not something aviation related, but very important to write about.The Letters to the Editir are still available, see here http://www.7days.ae/letters-to-the-editor.htmlTo blame this incident on the victim is at the very least purely naive but more so just plain disgusting.As has been mentioned before, the girl was scared, she was being followed and harassed by a group of local young men and was 'rescued' by another couple of nicer guys and given the circumstances decided to accept the offer of a lift, this was whilst she was waiting for a taxi. The rest has been well documented but what is interesting was the defendants claims that she 'agreed to have sex with them.' I know of no one who would knowingly agree to have consensual sex with six men she has just met.A search for “Gang Rape Dubai” resulted in 118,000 hits, but try this for further reading:A businesswoman who accused three men of gang rape has been arrested in Dubai and faces trial on charges of adultery.http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/01/03/wgang03.xmlThe following is banned by the local censors:www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=5676 (www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=5676)Another good article specifically targeting the Gang Rape mentality is found here:http://secretdubai.********.com/2005_03_01_secretdubai_archive.htmlThe shocking outcome of the case is now being highlighted in the local press, which is a good thing, but the memories of the event will scar this young girl's life forever. Her life has been changed forever because of this, Dubai has also changed dramatically in the five years service that I have given.

[4PW's]

I feel truly sorry for all you ex-South African's. You must have been through hell.

I overnight in Jo'berg, and feel it is without doubt the worst stopover I have ever made. I detest the place, and the people.

Nonetheless, to compare the problems of living in Africa with this rape case in Dubai is illogical.

Dubai is not Africa.

This rape case has nothing to do with Africa.

If you want the world to feel sorry for you, start another thread. I'm perfectly sure it'll be well read as there's lots to shock the world with.

As for those questioning the motives of the girl, to whatever degree, I look forward to seeing you similarly stricken with the grief her parents must now feel.

You are, without doubt, vermin!

[fatigueflyer]

Just to summarise:
1) Unless you are a local, expect a longer sentence
2) Unless you know that sheikh, expect a longer sentence
3) Unless you are a local, you are NOT above the law
4) Another lane on SZR has just increased your chances of being in an accident
5) From the few stupid posts regarding this thread, its ok to rape and get a lenient sentence, if you are a local
6) Dubai is NOT a safe place, unless you are a local
7) We are guests in this country.....keep this in mind
8) Better jobs out there....definitely...unless you happen to have your life's savings invested here!
9) Good luck! :suspect:

[1972]

Gutter language intended as a wind-up removed. Sure it's OK to get wound up '72; this is a serious issue but consider the fact that young people read these forums. Do you want them to be reading this language? 4HP


Come again? Gutter language? You can't be serious.

No word I posted that you have since removed came from the gutter - not one single expletive was included. So why the deletion?

All I did was treat someone with contempt who blatantly visited this thread purely with the intention to wind others up... and you gag ME for putting the little toe-rag in his place?

As for the 'young people' of this forum, I wonder how young they really are considering the fact this forum is intended for PILOTS. And if you think that ANY 'child' of 16 or more hasn't heard much worse than that, you must be living in a gloriously cocooned environment reminiscent of days from the Victorian era, or maybe you've been in the highly censored city of Dubai for too long?

By deleting my quote am I to think that if there's any 'young people' out there reading this, you'd sooner have them believe from all these supremely naiive, bigoted and dispicable posts that the poor girl was stupid for being alone and accepting a lift in the first place and therefore she had it coming to her, rather than have me writing non-offensive language in an attempt to rid this already appalling thread of a transparent bafoon from making further comment?

It's sad that things like this happen worldwide, but most other countries have the sense to recognise a crime and punish the perpetrators accordingly.

Does no-one here get it? The crime here is not just committing an act which the perpetrators should be made to pay heavily for, it's Dubai's pathetic attempt at identifying a crime and delivering 'justice'.

And for all the halfwits here who say the girl is at fault, you're also guilty of committing a crime - of indifference. If this is the stand you take, what example does that set for the future?

4HP, I think what you should be more concerned about where your 'young' readership is concerned, is that you are allowing people here to display an attitude which suggests it's okay for future perpetrators to get off lightly after committing such a heinous crime AND that an innocent victim was partly to blame. Wonderful.

To all the 'young' readers in here, especially YOUNG FEMALES, I hope you realise what standards your so-called 'peers' are setting by;

1) stooping so low as to bring into question the actions of an innocent woman who happens to be the victim of all this, and....
2) the lowly standards of mens behaviour that your 'peers' here seem willing to accept.

That said, some time in the future, you 'young people' might want to thank your 'peers' - people like those here - for turning your neighbourhood into a place where you are unable to leave the house at any time of the day or night for fear of being mugged, raped or murdered.

And by the way, I couldn't agree more with Scudsy who questions whether any of you are smart enough to be at the controls of an aircraft considering your laughably uneducated viewpoints posted here.

If its any indication of your level of intellect and competence inside the cockpit, I hope to god I never have the misfortune to fly with any of you.

I have an unenviable task '72 - moderation. When you made a reference to @nal sex I felt it was a little OTT and removed the reference.That is all. No gagging - go ahead, just keep it nice please. 4HP

[03Rnow30R]

4PW's,

So sorry you had a terrible stay in South Africa and detest South Africans. We may live in another country, but I assure you we are not ex-South Africans. I will be back in SA when my contract here is done.

In the beginnig of this thread it was mentioned that folks should consider the recent crimes in Dubai to help them make a more informed decision before making a move here. The few South Africans that mentioned what they have experienced regarding crime, only did so to show that there are some places much worse off than Dubai for crime and to illustrate why some of them may have moved here. Thanks for the geography lesson, but trust me we know Dubai isn't Africa. The posts were not made for your pitty, but to make a point.

[jollyikarus]

Try this link....

http://www.7days.ae/local-news/rape-case-verdict.html

It shows readers' letters below the actual article.

A case of exceptionally poor justice in a country which is soo eager to impress the rest of the world with all its 'achievements'!

Ikarus

[Streamline]

But everything they can cover up they will.

Do they rape their own pilots and young children... YES...how...soon on www

[4PW's]

03Rnow30R, it may have been clearer if I'd said I despise the many criminals in SA, of whom even I, in my short stay last month, came across, and that in a five star hotel at breakfast!

I have nothing against South Africans per se, black or white.

I apologise if my poorly written post may have taken the focus, however briefly, off the issue at hand.

And what a sound response from 1972.

[03Rnow30R]

4PW's,

Thanks for that. It does make it clearer and if it helps, we despise the criminal element in SA too. We are proud of our very beautiful country that is being ruined by crime. Hope you have a better experience next time around, unfortunately you have to be alert to try to avoid nasty experiences.

Now back to the issue of the post. Can anybody remember any incidents of non-nationals being tried here for rape? If so, what the sentence was?

[ratpoison]

I overnight in Jo'berg, and feel it is without doubt the worst stopover I have ever made.
Geeeeeez mate, I think you need an overnight in Lagos to see the worst. :p

[naughty but nice]

I was under the impression this was a forum for people to express their opinions??no??
If all you want to read is people agreeing with one another then this is the wrong forum for you..If someones post winds you up that much then maybe you need a lie down.

Am I the only one to think it strange for girls or guys to accept 'lifts' from complete strangers?

Very odd behaviour.

The guy was probably some gay flighty who thought himself up for some 'action' with a few locals..Im sorry to say but these things happens when you go around acceoting lifts in the first place from people you do not know.

MY OPINION..THEIR OWN FAULT.

[Scudsy]

Plonker


A Boy beneath contempt, in no way could you be considered a "man"

[GoForIt]

Farmers don't get killed or chased of their land by 21 year old "War Veterans"(By the way where was the USA,England,Australia,New Zeeland and Canada when that happend? Oh sorry no Oil in Zim! I forgot)
Here we go again. The USA has got to come to everyone's rescue? I wish we could! But if we tried, we'd be vilified for it just like we are now! Damned if we do, and damned if we don't.

There was no oil in Bosnia either. There was no oil in Haiti either. There was no oil in Somalia either.

If we went into Iraq for the oil, then why did we go into Afganistan, Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia? If we went into Iraq for the oil, then why are half the USA airlines in bankruptcy due to fuel costs? For the first time in the history of Iraq (and all the previous empires that ruled that piece of real estate), the people are going to the polls and with ballots in hand. AMAZING! Those Damn Americans! How dare they....

We may indeed fail in Iraq. The odds don't look good at the moment. But we have a history of spending our money and our lives so that others can enjoy freedom. I'm proud of it.

[BYMONEK]

Naughty

There's nothing NICE about you mate!:E

[davidletterman]

I agree with Goforit....

Anyway, if oil was the real issue, Venezuela is much closer than Asia or Africa... lots of natural gas in Bolivia too...even Canada would be much easier

ah, and yes, why do so many people migrating to the US anyway?

:yuk:

[Cerberus]

Goforit,

Its not oil, its not America, its business!

Look at the Bosnian massacres and the Hutus and Tutsi genocide. The west will not get involved unless its own interests are going to be affected or it has a more personal agenda.

Iraq may have been about revenge but pretty much all the rest...Its just business!

Back to the thread here, there is no doubt that life in Dubai is much less threatening than in lots of places around the world. But...crime does exist and then double standards are employed. 2 years for a premeditated con that led to a gang rape? Probably they will be pardoned during Eid. A non-local would have been jailed for 8 years and the deported at the end of the sentence. I just checked todays date on the paper...1427.

It isn't right, it isn't fair but sadly its the rules of the game. Until the UAE squares away these sorts of things it will never join the big leagues.

[miss petal]

smart girl wouldn't jump in to a stranger's car.
yes woman has right to get drunk, but be smart about it. I've been living here for 9 years, get used to go back home at 4 in the morning from night out without worrying if someone else is following me like I would feel if I'm in London, Paris etc etc.... but does this sort of safety can make me less aware of what's going on around me. I don't think so, as I still do this when I go out with friends until now.

I don't let my self drunk if only with one or 2 friends, be sensible about it. You have to take care of yourself.

I'm not commenting what happened with the victim, breaks my heart. But
I would consider it's a HUGE problem if the boys are actually the one who kidnapped her and force her to get in to the car.. but she's the one who willing to get in to a STRANGER's car.

I'm not a monster, rape is the worst thing can happen to a woman and yes no one deserve that in any under circumstances. If only the girls can just be smart and take care of themself realy.

* willing to get in to stranger's car ?
* force and kidnapped and rape her ?

how many rape case in your home town gentlemen? if you have a daughter, tell her to be smart and take car of her self. especially when you decided to go back to where you coming from....

[chinawladi]

GoForIt:
"But we have a history of spending our money and our lives so that others can enjoy freedom. I'm proud of it."
This might aswell came out of Al Qaida propaganda against the foreign invasions in the ME. Macabre?? It's only a matter of perspective. Just as it is a matter of perspective to judge if it was partly the girls fault by getting in that car.
If someone tries to put this into the right perspective, he or she's in the wrong place. Anyone surprised by the UAE judges verdict forgets that it's 1427 around here. How long did we need to change our verdicts from back when we counted that year? Even armed with handys and cayennes, their mindset is middle aged and it will not be the handfull of expats from USA, EU, AUS that will change anything soon.

[145qrh]

The mind set is indeed from the dark ages.It will change in the middle east, for better or worse , who at this moment can say..

BUt change will happen, it has started. Next time you are in the pub , have a look and see how many guys in dish dashas you see..

As for expats changing things,,,,well it has too start somewhere, as a wise man once said " the longest journey starts but with a single step"

[Cerberus]

Miss, you are missing the point! She was escaping from a bunch of guys that were harassing her. They were giving her a hard time, it was getting ugly.

She tried to escape but couldn't and then a knight in shining armour seeing her predicament offered to get her away from a nastily developing situation. She took the lifeline and then discovered that it was all a set up.

Let me see, you are in London or New York and a drunken git is hassling you. A mini-cab comes by and offers to take you away from the scene. Nobody else is about so you take the ride.....yep, it happened!

You are assuming she was drunk and stupid. She was in a crappy situation and tried her best to get away from it but was being set up by them all. It was not her fault but a clever manipulation by a bunch of scum with no respect for women.

Cerberus

[miss petal]

I'm aware of that Ceberus, I'm not missing the point.
But the second car still bunch of STRANGER....

I wish that she was drunk, so that more make sense that she didn't think.
But if she wasn't drunk then she should have thought about it.

My point is.. why is so hard for some people that this is a two ways.
Why is so hard to some people to think or accept the possibility that it could be her fault too at some degree?
Read my post again, the difference for being kidnapped and forced to get in to the car... ( if this happened, I wouldn't say anything about her ) and willingly get in to the car with bunch of stranger.


Manipulation by those scumbags are tottaly disguisting, that's clear to all of us.

I probably missing the point for some people, but hey that's just my opinion.

Ceberus, btw getting to a cab is tottaly different story... ;)

girls .. take care!!

[shawarma]

How can you all sit in judgment? Have you never made a mistake. This girls mistake ended with a bunch of guys RAPING her. I bet she wishes she never got in the car and I bet she wishes she was as street wise as some of you. Do you feel the mistake she made, makes her guilty of what happened. I hope I would not make a mistake and the consequences were quite so high. If a daughter,sister, mother and in this day a son or mate was to be subject to a GANG RAPE under what grounds would it have been their fault.

the thread wasnt started about the good U S of A so i wount comment, start a new thread and i might...........................

[mensaboy]

Miss Petal, it is implied by your name that you are female and I would assume the wife of someone here in Dubai. I may be totally wrong there but that is irrelevant. What is relevant is that a woman was forcibly confined, kidnapped and repeatedly raped by men who can't even be referred to as human beings. There is NO excuse for what they did and there is absolutely no fault on the part of the victim.
Clearly from reading your posts you are either ignorant or somewhat illiterate or both. Your point of view is archaic and lacks sound judgement. To make things perfectly clear a woman can do as she pleases subject to local law... up and to the point.... where she says NO. If a man or a gang of men cannot control their basic urges and decide to violate another person they should be held accountable to the full extent of the law.
Anyone even suggesting that this victim is in any way at fault should sit back and reconsider. As an aside, I dont think there is a religion on the entire planet that doesn't agree that in some form or another each individual will be held accountable for their actions. I truly hope this is true.

[Payscale]

Dubai....The city that scares...:\

[miss petal]

Which part that I said being raped is her fault?
I have discussed this with my female friends and family, it's a horrible story.

I was just pointing the beginning of the situation...
that no one, anywhere ever should get in to someone's car that you don't know.
( I'm tired of saying this... )
I'm a witness of my own exflamate that I met at the bar by herself drunk with some guy! When SHE's the one who's kissing him and the scene got nasty. I couldn't leave the place while I was with my friends, I didn't know if I probably in their way ( my ex flamate and the guy ).. but then I had to take her home. The next morning, she didn't know the guy! What happened if I didn't take her home?

This is exactly DIFFERENT situation with the gang rape case

I just wish the girls would be a bit sensible wherever they go and start to minimize the possible threat on themself.

I probably won't be able to make you understand my point ever, as my english is limited then is going to mislead and start arguments.
Well I'm sorry if I offended all of you here, not my attention.

Mensaboy.. I agree with you that the rapist are not human and not acceptable in any form ( I said that already too I think .. )

[Cerberus]

Missy,

How is a taxi different? It is still a stranger that you don't know and guess what there have been several incidents around the world and even in Dubai involving taxi drivers, rape and murder.

You are right she shouldn't have got in the car but she had a decision to make. She felt endangered by the situation she was in and needed to escape. In Dubai I haven't noticed anyone coming to anyone else aid in difficult situations, everyone counts the dirhams and walks down the other side of the street. I'll bet she saw no way out but was then offered a lifeline and took it.

Under different circumstances, with hindsight, if she had refused the lift and been raped would you be arguing she should have taken the lift? How often have you been in the situation where you have been out and taxis have become as rare as rocking horse manure? What about all the other people that were around, why didn't they help? Etc etc etc.

They are criminals and she is the victim. Yes we are all responsible for our personal security but sometimes you cannot win. Try poor Mr Falconio in the outback - should he have gone backpacking? Jill Dando being shot in the head - should she have kept the door shut? The poor girl in Thailand phoning her mum to wish her happy New Year and gets raped and drowned by a couple of fishermen.

She made a judgement call and lost. But I don't think the outcome would have been any different if she had stayed with the guys that were harrassing her or tried to run. I think they were going to abduct and rape her no matter what she did. That was their plan and she was the one unlucky enough to get in the way.

Hindsight is always 20/20 shame we don't get it before the event! Its also a shame that you weren't there to take her home.

Cerberus

[Outta Heresoon]

Cerberus
Good on you mate. Points well spoken. For the lot of you who keep trying to justify and blame otherwise, no matter what the sceneiro, RAPE is still the INVOLOUNTARY act of sexual acts perpetrated against an individual. PERIOD!!! There are no if's, what's, or what could have been's. If she said no ...IT's NO!! Regardless about the circumstances leading up to the crime, the fact remains, a violation of a HUMAN was made. I don't care what religion you practice, every one of them hold RAPE right up there with MURDER! In a woman's eyes, this is just about what happens. You egotistical animals that have stood in the defence of the guilty are pretty lame individuals. You stand behind an anonimous facade available here on this forum, but would you be so bold to make the same point at dinner with 14 of your peers? I'm sure you would also be the one to say "if a woman accepted a drink from you that was spiked, it's your permission to RAPE her" too. I am not directing this at the majority who respect the rights and freedoms of individuals, regardless of race, religion or sexual orientation, but to those who seem to think that ones heinous actions against others are justified by the sheer ignorance or indiscretion of another human being.

[miss petal]

Cerberus..
you pointed very well from your posting.
I may lack of judgment and don't know the exact story and the real situation.
You're right that woman's insting is to find help.. I didn't know that it was a nasty situation.. my thought would be both situation something that you can avoid.

I'm sorry but I'm not going to keep arguing and people think I'm a monster.
Cause Cerberus I think you know where I'm coming from posting at the first place... ( my point ) and maybe only a little that you accepted but hey I appreciated that.

let me rephrase .. she's not stupid but probably she's unlucky...
Sorry guys.. I am a woman .. and I don't have to express my feeling here how I feel about the victim ok? or the rape in general...
I'm just pointing the lack of self security here in Dubai .. please be honest to yourself how the girls are wearing today when they go out, almost nothing! how many times you see a girl passed out on the table with none of her friends on the scene? ( please refrain saying that I would be ok/accepted the rape later on towards the girl ) I'm not an animal! This not only led to rape but minor harrassing can be prevent.

the only post I can understand is Cerberus and made me understand and made me come up and said hey I may be wrong with all the post I said.. you know why? Cause he's the only who can talk in such manner ( sign of educated and smarter than the rest ) and without hot blooded head calling other people animal.. will you do that too when you're at dinner with 14 people??

I'm out of here.. thanks Cerberus, but this forum is too nasty for me to be here.

tata

[Scudsy]

Someone dies on Dubai roads almost once every day.

Check this link to read more about driving in Dubai:

http://www.7days.ae/local-news/sheer-carnage.html

:sad:

:eek:

[shawarma]

also their fault for getting in the car...........................

[Scudsy]

Four men try to kill one of their many victims.

Check this link:

http://www.7days.ae/local-news/gang-raped-five-women,-court-hears.html


I wonder if Miss Petal would like to enlighten us to their "mistakes".

I suspect Miss Petal is suffering from the brain washing of some male orientated cultures that surpress female rights under some ludicrous religious banner, which perverts the true message of honoured relgions. This is not an attack on the ME or Arab cultures. I include all "looney" taliban style anti-women views which can be seen in in many countries, for example certain aspects of the USA (Fundamentalist Christians active mostly in Republican politics).

OK that little rant is off my chest, please do check out the link above if you are considering driving in Dubai.

Take care out there,

Scudsy


I may not agree with what you say but I will defend your right to say it

[Streamline]

The bottom line is: “If you are in a system that allows you to get away with crime you are less restrained in committing one”

If you want to cash in on the local machos you are playing with fire.


http://www.uaeprison.com

[Arnie DeDump]

... Site blocked by Etisalat, surprise, surprise !

[ratpoison]

For those who get it blocked, here's just a "small" part of the article.
Read it and weep. No more child jockeys in the UAE. Yeah right. !! What a top part of the world.
It’ s the most polite and religiously grounded analogy I can use, to describe those whose who have propagated the kidnapping, abuse, starvation and rape of little boys for mere sport, without being censored.

I am taking a rughksa (license ) this Ramadan to indulge in feelings that are not consistent with the spirit of this holy month, feelings of rage and anger, feelings which have obliged me to vent in frustration and to invent justifications for the foul language which has defiled my fasting breath. And because, for many of us, external actions seldom represent of our more noble internal motivations, I am taking the license to motivate you to do the same and follow my lead in the interest of awakening your souls to a calling higher then maintaining your pious and restrained fasting temperament. I am inviting you to get mad, to get really mad, because patience in the face of an egregious injustice, even during this blessed month, cannot be a virtue.

This Ramadan while my despair has descended into anger, my foul mouth has ascended into these words, words that have attached me to my lap top instead of my prayer rug. While I have not been motivated towards piety this month, I have at least been inspired to exercise a kind of honesty devoid of political correctness. And In my hunger and frustration I am now compelled to call a spade a spade and to label a royal sheikh a shaytan (devil). It’ s the most polite and religiously grounded analogy I can use, to describe those whose who have propagated the kidnapping , abuse, starvation and rape of little boys for mere sport, without being censored.

Although the enslavement of these boys is predominantly in the Arab world, you will NOT be relieved to know that I have not found any documented cases of the enslavement of a single Arab boy. It seems that only south Asians and Africans, who are evidently dispensable variations of human life, are being traffic kited into slavery. Political correctness is demanding I absolve the Arab peoples, myself included, by saying that the majority of us are NOT, ethnocentric, xenophobic members of the great tribe of the Saudi royal family, whose leaders and sheiks have for the last thirty some years been trafficking young boys as old as one and a half to work as camel jockeys in the camel racing business. A sport where the lighter the jockey, the faster the camel can race. Consequently the younger and more emaciated the child slave, the better he can serve his master. These masters are the Arab sheikhs of the Gulf states and have become emissaries of the shaytan to the state -- which is our ummah!Facing the Facts:

While I have a great many things to say, and I am never at a loss for words, If I speak to you on behalf of the 40,000 children who are being used as slave labor in the Middle East and Arab countries, I would have to restrict myself to saying only one thing, the only thing that the childish mind of a deprived four or five year old boy can manage to say with his parched lips in the heat of the dessert sun—HELP, HELP ME, HELP US. And all I can add to their plea is to say, help them and help yourself, because apathy to the sale of one more Pakistani boy into slavery is tantamount to a discounted sale on your own compassionate soul, and eventually will lead to the whole sale of our entire ummah.

Most of these children have been kidnapped from their villages in countries like Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Sudan to become trained as child camel jockeys to serve as entertainment for the royal families. But much more then just entertainment, they are also needed to fuel the gambling addictions of the sheikhs and in true mafia style, their drive to compete with other royal families. And where they compete by exercising their camels, we must compete by exercising compassion for their victims.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars in betting money changes hands during these races, all at the expense of these children. Prizes are awarded for the winners and the trainers, but nothing, not even a decent meal, is afforded the children who are awakened at three o’clock in the morning from their metal huts to train for 18 hours, subsisting on a diet of bread and water. They are deliberately made to go hungry to keep their weight down and while they are ordered; to feed the prized camels, they are beaten and shocked with electricity if they attempt to consume any of the animal’s food. The children are required to sleep in huts made from metal sheets in temperatures exceeding one hundred degrees. Due to the dangerous nature of this sport many boys fall and are then trampled to death. Some sustain serious injuries including permanent damage to their sexual organs from all the rigorous bouncing on the camels back. Sexual abuse is common and many boys are raped by their caretakers.

Most of the children are kidnapped by local agents who will either drug the children and flea with them or will lure improvised families with promises of employment, and education. Kidnappers have also posed as representatives of multinational companies and offered to recruit their children for training to work in reputable companies. Many mothers and fathers are duped into thinking that they are acting in the best interest of their child by securing their future, and they never suspect that they may never see them again. The highest risk areas for child trafficking are Rahim Yar Khan, Dera Ghazi Khan and southern Punjab.

There are an estimated 30, 000 active racing camels and 17 racetracks throughout the UAE, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah, with the five main stadiums located near the rulers palaces. And while Pakistani officials and human rights groups have taken honest measures to prevent trafficking, the sheiks and shaytans are not being held responsible by either the State Department or by the Muslim world.

But in the midst of all this criminal activity one man, one hero, one angel of mercy named Ansar Burney, a lawyer by profession, has dedicated his life to the rescue and return of hundreds and these children. He is Chairman of the Ansar Burney Welfare Trust international, Prisoners Aid Society and the Bureau of Missing and kidnapped children. He has already rescued hundreds of children and returned them back to Pakistan, Bangladesh and other parts of the world. Ansar Burney and his organization not only rescue these boys but they also go to great lengths to reunite them with their families. But tragically many of the boys were so young when they had been estranged from their homes, that they no longer recognize their parents or speak their mother tongue.

HBO’S real Sports show with Bryant Gumbel did a three month undercover investigation where many of these atrocities were documented on hidden camera. It was an investigation which was of particular interest to the residents of Louiville, Kentucky where one of the major players in thoroughbred racing in their state was accused of engaging in this practice. The richest crown prince Sheikh Mohammed and his brothers who make up Godolfin Racing, are the owners of countless thoroughbreds and two Kentucky horse farms. Just this September Sheikh Mohammad spent more than $29 million on 40 yearlings. The HBO special uncovered that his passion for horse racing in the Kentucky Derby also found its outlet in the camel racing of the United Arab Emirates.

I too watched that HBO special, but because of a weak heart had to walk away when one of the boys of only 5 or 6 years old, nonchalantly stated that he had been raped the night before and pulled down his pants to prove it. One scene showed a boy in a hospital recovering from a womb after a fall had slit his stomach completely open.

The United Nations have of course followed the usual protocols when human rights are violated and held a convention that resulted in the prohibition of child trafficking for use as camel jockeys, a convention that was ratified by the United Arab Emirates but apparently has yet to be enforced. Aside from confiscating cameras at the racing tracks to eliminate any evidence of their crimes, the sheikhs like the shaytan are above and immune to the laws which govern the rest of humanity and have continued to traffic children for the purposes of camel racing.

[desertrose]

This is sickening!!

[Dune]

No wonder those who have been here only a fews months/years seem to think the place is "mecca". Welcome to the hidden underbelly that is Dubai:
'Hidden Misery'
Wednesday, 01 March 2006
Domestic violence in Dubai is much higher than newly released police statistics suggest, the head of a women’s shelter said.
Figures released yesterday by the human rights section of Dubai police said they dealt with 45 cases of family problems in the city last year – only four of which were violence against women.
The rest of the cases involved child abuse, verbal abuse of wives and children, and child abandonment. But Sharla Musabih who runs ‘City of Hope,’ a shelter for abused women in Dubai, last night said police figures did not reflect the reality.
“Last month alone, I received five cases and to suggest that only four women were beaten up all last year is simply hard to believe,” she added. Victims came from a wide variety of nationalities.
The problem lies within the system, Mrs Musabih said. “Abused women who go to the police are always sent back home after police summons the husband and ask him to sign a form promising not to beat up his wife again.
The humiliated husband then goes back home and beats his wife even harder for putting him through this,” she added. This often happened several times before City of Hope took the victim in.
“Police usually call me to tell me this woman has suffered enough after she’s gone to them countless times bearing bruises, scars and other injuries,” she said. Often, for cultural reasons, abuse was never even reported to the police.
The shelter, set up in 2001, currently houses 30 women and ten children, “and we had to rent another villa to deal with pending cases many of which are high risk,” Mrs Musabih said.
Major Aref Baqer, head of the human rights department said he was “very happy with the humane and social work” it was doing. He said the department was able to resolve 80 per cent of the complaints brought to its attention.

[Gulf News]

This in yesterdays Gulf News is a further example of the sophistication of the legal system in the UAE.
http://search.gulfnews.com/articles/06/03/02/10022440.html

[plovdiv]

There is a an offence known as 'contempt of court'.

It appears that it applies in the UAE just as much as anywhere else in the world.

[Ray Darr]

in regards to the rape case,,,first of all who the hell would go alone to madinat jumeirah,the girl was probably drunk out of her mind when she went partying at trilogy,,second of all who would get into a land cruiser at 3:30 in the morn with 4 guyz..
jeezz,,stop with the nonsense..shez the person who has to be blamed..
there are better things to be discussed at this forum..
OK, you prick, you have tipped the balance of human decency. YOU BLAME THE GIRL for this HORRENDOUS CRIME that happened to her?? I hope if YOU get tossed in jail for some petty crime and someone wants you to be their play-toy you can rest-assured in your own stinking logic that as YOU are forcefully penetrated, YOU would realize "oh, it's my fault I am here anyway, therefore I can't blame him for doing this... I will blame myself!"
What a twit. Seriously, you are damn lucky you are not meeting people in person when discussing your so-called logic on why this poor girl was raped by these bastards. You'd get clocked pretty damn fast by myself and many others when we'd hear your vile, twisted thoughts. It is a simple fact that SCUM like them who can't control when and where and how to use their penis are fully responsible for these heinous acts.
I hope nothing like what happened to that girl, REGARDLESS of the situation she may have been in, ever happens to any females YOU know, be them friends, family or foes.
Go re-think how you believe is proper behaviour by the males of our species.
...end of legit rant.

[jdoe]

Consecutive articles from todays Gulf News!
http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/Police_and_The_Courts/10028696.html
http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/Police_and_The_Courts/10028694.html
BTW, the locals who gang raped the girl got 4 years!

[robo]

jdoe - no they got 2 years!!

[Shake]

New York Times ran this article on the plight of immigrant workers in the UAE:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/26/international/middleeast/26dubai.html?_r=1&oref=slogin


"I wish the rich people would realize who is building these towers."

[BigGeordie]

The rich people don't CARE who is building the towers.....(until they fall down!)

[Shake]

Workers words not mine...

$150/month, 10 months unpaid, filthy living conditions, 12 hour shifts with up to 2 hours commuting to the shifts...

Dubai, the city that doesn't give a damn.

[Evita]

Maybe as a female crew living in Dubai I could explain to you the situation we are in. When I got accepted I have been told about the tax free wage, free accomodation, the crime free place we will be living in, the amazing destinations we go to and the bonus we get if we finish our 3 year contract.
You can go on http://www.emiratesgroupcareers.com/ Living in Dubai and then Law and Order to view the information Cabin Crew get.
Finally we get to Dubai. In the first week we have a meeting with Welfare and we are told that:

It is illegal to live with a partner of the opposite sex unless you're married or related and if you are married you will lose the free accomodation and will be given a Living Out Allowance that will not cover the expenses.
It is illegal to kiss in or show affection in public. Also we were shown a newspaper cutting about a couple that got 6 months jail and then deported for kissing in public.
We have to constantly watch our drinks as it is very common to have your drinks spiked.
We were also told how the law in Dubai can turn against you, shall you get raped and decide to report it.
If you get pregnant and not married is considered as a crime.
Now bear in mind that I just left my life, my job, my family and friends. I have been in the Middle East for a week when I find out all this. Had I been told this before I wouldn't have taken up the offer, however since I spent all my money on Medicals, photos and two relocations since I wasn't living in my home country, leaving Dubai after a week was not an option.

Basically the british Cabin Crew that got gang raped was faced with the same situation. Funny how from everyone's comments no one considered that maybe this girl had been drugged, something that happens quite often.
So I gave up my social life since I don't intend to be paranoid all night, watch my drink, wonder if someone bribed the barman to spike my drink, get harrassed by way too many men ... even though i'm wearing jeans and T Shirt.

Yes Dubai is virtually crime free since not so many girls report rapes as they know how it all can turn against them. Also by law we are unable to give our freedom of speech on newspapers or media.

It would be grateful if EK would give the complete information about how life really is in Dubai before we sign the contract fully knowing the way of life we are used to and the extreme we are going to.

Also what I cannot understand is how does it make sense for these men to rape this girl to get 2 years in prison and then a guy gets 4 years imprisonment for possessing 1.25 grams of cocaine?

I do respect the fact that I live in a muslim country and I respect the fact that there is a large number of different cultures. I do appreciate that yes I have a nice free apartment to live in and have more benefits than other crew in other countries. But I would also have appreciated being told that I would be spending my time in Dubai in my lovely free apartment shall I decide not to risk getting into a terrible situation like the horrible event that happened to the british girl and other girls that are too scared to speak up.

[Payscale]

Flight attendant jailed over card theft
By Alia Al Theeb , Staff Reporter



Dubai: A flight attendant who stole her colleague's credit card and used it to buy perfume and jewellery will spend six months in jail, a court ruled yesterday.

The Dubai Court of First Instance sentenced the 40-year-old African, identified as L.W. to six months in jail for stealing from her colleague. She will be deported after serving her term.

The Dubai Public Prosecution charged L.W., with stealing 50 euros (Dh235) and a credit card belonging to her 25-year-old Australian colleague.

The suspect had told the court that she stole her colleague's credit card from her purse while they were on-board a flight. She confessed she used it in a number of shops in Dubai to purchase perfume, earrings and a bracelet. However, she denied stealing the 50 euros.

The defence lawyer had told the judge earlier that the public prosecution "exaggerated" the charge sheet.

"The suspect and the client are friends and work colleagues. They settled the dispute and the victim dropped her complaint."

The victim reported the incident to the police whose investigations led to the arrest of L.W.

[Evita]

http://www.pprune.org/forums/images/icons//icon8.gif EK Predator...Beware! by EKrats

Came across EKrats message was surprised more people heard about it. No one has been told anything in the company. Wonder how many more things we should be aware about that we are not told unless we happen to be told by other crew

[Evita]

in regards to the rape case,,,first of all who the hell would go alone to madinat jumeirah,the girl was probably drunk out of her mind when she went partying at trilogy,,second of all who would get into a land cruiser at 3:30 in the morn with 4 guyz..

jeezz,,stop with the nonsense..shez the person who has to be blamed..

there are better things to be discussed at this forum..


You seem to know a lot of details about this case. Madinat, Trilogy, drunk out of her mind.
So great to be able to prove my point why I don't bother to go out thanks to people like you. This is exactly what a girl would get from the police officers shall she decide to report a rape.
Maybe if the girl has had her drink spiked she wasn't given much choice.
May one day VBALASU go through a similar experience and get blamed for it. And if you do please keep us informed it would be a great pleasure to hear. w:mad: r !!

[brassplate]

This sure gives Dubai a really bad name. Does events like this get noticed by that poor girls embassy? Will this damage Dubai's image as "The place to be" in the ME? Maybe something drastic needs to take place that will cause the Dubai government to work on it. This event may yet have something good come out of it.

[Ghostflyer]

Dubai is fine until something goes wrong but guess what it hasn't changed for years so even a little research on the web should let you know what you are getting into. Go and search Amnesty International - This is from 2002.

Death sentences and cruel judicial punishments

At least two people were sentenced to death by Shari'a (Islamic) courts in Fujairah and Dubai. Both men had been convicted of murder.

At least 18 flogging sentences were passed during the year, all allegedly for adultery and all but two were passed on foreign nationals by Shari'a courts in Fujairah and Dubai.

Death in custody and 'disappearance'

Between May and August, five Libyan nationals were arrested. All five men had escaped from Libya several years earlier, fearing arrest in connection with their political or religious activities. One of the five, 'Abdullah Abu al-Qasim al-Ghazal, was arrested in 'Ajman on 31 August. His wife was summoned to al-Khalidiya Police Station in Abu Dhabi on 6 September and was informed that he had committed suicide. She refused to collect his body and asked for an autopsy to be carried out on the grounds that there were marks on his body and that the official notification papers for his death reportedly stated the cause of death as ''unknown''. No information was available regarding any investigation into the death of 'Abdullah Abu al-Qasim al-Ghazal or the current whereabouts and status of the other four men.

Political arrests

In the aftermath of the 11 September attacks in the USA and military intervention by the USA and its allies in Afghanistan, scores of nationals of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) were arrested throughout the Emirates between September and November. They were arrested at their places of work, homes or a local mosque. Dozens had been released by the end of the year. However, there were fears that others might be held incommunicado and could be at risk of human rights violations including torture or ill-treatment.

Forcible return

Jawid al-Ghussein, a 70-year-old Palestinian businessman, was forcibly returned to areas under the jurisdiction of the Palestinian Authority on 22 April, where he was held incommunicado in a presidential guesthouse for several weeks. (See Palestinian Authority entry.)

Intergovernmental organizations

In June, the UAE acceded to International Labour Organisation Conventions No.111 on Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) and No. 182 on Worst Forms of Child Labour. In November, press reports stated that the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs was studying proposed amendments to the UAE Labour Law. Although the law prohibits child labour in the UAE, children from Asia and Africa are often trafficked to the UAE to work as jockeys in camel races. They endure extremely poor conditions and are often abused.

Freedom of expression

In September 2000, an unidentified individual claiming to represent the Ministry of Information reportedly contacted newspapers, including al-Khaleej, and television shows in the UAE, informing them that approximately 15 presenters and writers could no longer appear in their respective media. This alleged ban appeared to remain in force at the end of 2001.

In March, three US nationals were arrested in Dubai for promoting Christianity by distributing Christian religious materials on busy streets. They were released on bail in early April, and press reports of 11 April quoted US embassy sources stating that all three had been deported.


Oh, yeah I forgot to add this. There is another country where they regularly not only sentence people to death but actually kill them. They also have a record of detaining foreign suspects without trial in an off-shore prison.

In recent years, however, numerous studies have found that one in seven people sent to death row are later proven innocent. And in one disturbing recent case, a prisoner was 48 hours from execution when he was proven innocent. In the last 25 years, 102 innocent people have been released from death row.

I wonder how many weren't reprieved, so maybe we shouldn't get too pious about Sharia justice in Dubai.

[Monty77]

Obviously, nothing like this happens in the 'West'.

Pure as the driven snow are we?

Look around and open your eyes.

[waves-dubai]

I agree with those who are proud to be liberal and express their opinions in a so called democratic country. I find it a bit contrasting that the government body is able to block sites such as youtube, skype and myspace as their contents are immoral. However i can get my pick of the best prostitutes in Bur dubai or Deira or I can go to the cinema and watch movies that are so loaded with nudity they should be rated X, or why not drive to Um AlQwain and get a car load of alcohol and invite my shaded CID friends.....Why not look into the smaller things first?.

[EK Pilot]

From the BBC News website...

A Pakistani laments Dubai

BBC Urdu service's Masud Alam returns to live in Pakistan after 15 years abroad. A holiday on the way gives food for thought.

Departing London was easier than I imagined. Partly because I was too groggy leaving home at 6.30 am to entertain any kind of emotions. And also, since friends, acquaintances and near-strangers had said their farewells with such fervour and persistence, staying back any longer was out of the question.

At the entrance to Gatwick airport, there was nothing and no one to look back on except the taxi driver who dropped us there, and nothing to look forward to except the clichéd promise of airline hospitality and the vague hope of finding a couch in the departure lounge to catch a wink.

Wife counted the luggage pieces every 10 steps or so, each time asking me to check if I still had the passports and tickets in the maroon wallet I was holding in my left hand.

Kids, too, walked in a dazed state and followed her various instructions without complaining, which was remarkable because they are neither used to listening - owing to the earpieces filling their young heads with pop music nearly all the time - nor complying with parental advice without a moan.

Hideous and expensive

I had obviously over-estimated the tantrums of the daughter, the apparent introspective state of the son and the increasingly unstable mood of the wife during the last few weeks in London. Otherwise I would not have booked a short holiday in Dubai on our way to Islamabad.

It was meant to cheer us up and to ease our descent back into the womb of the motherland. It turned out to be anything but....

I have lived in Dubai before but now it seems like it was ages ago. Then, it used to be a small, clean, quiet and prosperous place. It is now as hideous, noisy, crowded and obscenely expensive as so many other cities. Dubai has always wanted to be something different from what it is.

It metamorphosed from a tiny fishing village to a modern city, then a shoppers' paradise, a playground for the rich, a tourist's haven and a lot more in just over half a century.

But in the process, the place is beginning to look more like a huge exhibition of assorted real estate development than a place to live and grow in. Dubai was under construction 15 ago. It is even more so now. The city's skyline is made up of cranes. Hundreds, possibly thousands of these monster machines are working day and night every which way you look.

'Quality Expatriates'

And for every crane there is a brigade of trucks, earthmoving equipment and mobile electricity generators, clogging up the already crowded streets.

There is an excellent network of roads and bridges, but the fancy cars capable of doing 300km an hour can merely crawl at 3km an hour for most of the day. The traffic issue is so bad it has not avoided the notice of the authorities. Dubai is now building a network of underground railways which may eventually ease the congestion on the roads.

But for the moment it has meant more disruptions and detours, resulting in nightmarish delays to commuters.

One aspect that hasn't changed in all these years is Dubai's fixation on 'quality expatriates' - a euphemism for White Europeans, or the rich and famous, or, in particular, the rich and famous White Europeans.

I used to work for a newspaper here that paid different salaries to employees of similar qualifications and work experience, based on their ethnic origin. Whites topped the list, followed by Arabs, Indians and Pakistanis, the Filipinos, the Bangladeshis...

This bias seems to be more institutionalised now.

Visa restrictions continue to be relaxed for westerners and keep getting tougher for the nationals of the Third World.

'Apartheid'

All the new urban developments are aimed at White executives (there's hardly any other kind of Whites here) and moneyed Arabs.

The Asians, who make up the entire labour force that builds these fancy structures, are still the worst-paid workers, forced to live in out-of-town labour camps, away from their loved ones for years at a stretch because they cannot afford to travel back home or bring their families to live in Dubai.

A recent newspaper survey found that the labourers' pay and benefits packages have not been revised in more than a decade whereas the cost of living has doubled or trebled in sectors like housing, healthcare and utilities. The middle income group is doing only slightly better.

The city is generous enough to allow property ownership rights (on leasehold) to people with money, but chooses not to notice the white collar workers who are being evicted from low-cost public sector housing estates to make room for more upmarket developments. They are also being squeezed out of the rental market in the private sector faster than they can send their families back to their home countries.

It is probably just me, but I found it dispiriting to be holidaying in a place where the people who feed, drive, and generally look after me don't even earn enough to maintain their dignity as a human being. But apparently they get enough dirhams to feed their families back home, and that is what makes them go on living a life of exploitation, servitude, despair and hope.

I would rather holiday in South Africa. I hear apartheid is a thing of the past there.

[ironbutt57]

The only comment from an Emirati friend..."if all the Muslims in the UAE pray for rain...it will flood in Pakistan"

[Dct no speed]

To our dear friend who would like to visit SA because there is no more Apartheid.
Please talk to those who, have had to leave the coutry , because they are not "dark " enough for the country's new Affirmative plan !!!!

"Apartheid" (a SA word only) is discrimination of a white(minority) against a non white (majority). Now if the Majority discriminate against the minority what do you call that? Rasism or the new SA constitution

You are right "Apartheid" is dead, BUT It was replaced with this:

15 000 plus Hijackings a year
18 000 plus murders a year :*
20 000 plus atempted murders:confused:
A person gets raped every 20 min In Sa:=
More than 1 Cash in transit Heist per day.
80 % Of municipalties are in serious fanacial trouble! :yuk:
Estimated 10 000 000 illegal Immigrants
(Info bases on Police reports and Insurance Company claims only)

I am a born South African, an African, one who hates Rasism and loathed Apartheid. My SA is and was wonderful country, The country you want to visit is like most countries in Africa, becoming a ticking time bomb.

We have lost the Madiba Magic !

Remember Zimbabwe too,was a great place, not more than 6 years ago . Look at it now!!!

Agree with the views of the way the work force gets treated here, it was never that bad back home. Let us hope and pray for some relieve for those that work incrediable hours for very low wages.

Lets us all stop and give something to these guys at this time of Festivity!

Merry Christmas and Eid Mubarak to all!

[fractional]

http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/General/10091864.html
I'm sure:confused: they have done their homework...:rolleyes:
Enjoy this special evening.

[White Knight]

So what happenend to you then???

I think we (expats) are generally aware of this situation - it's the way it is. Wrong I know, especially for a city that's clamouring to join the world stage, but "what to do?":rolleyes:

[uplock]

Police and The Courts

Published: 25/01/2007 12:00 AM (UAE)

Suspended jail term for former pilot confirmed
By Bassam Za'za' Staff Reporter

Dubai: The Dubai Court of Appeal confirmed a suspended nine-month jail term against a former pilot who was found guilty of assaulting and threatening to kill five hotel and police staff after a drinking binge.

The court confirmed the sentence for 24-year-old S.S., a UAE national and fined him Dh1,000. The Public Prosecution had charged S.S. with the assault and slander of two policemen and resisting arrest, in addition to threatening and assaulting five hotel employees and police personnel. S.S. was also charged with damaging property and drinking four bottles of liquor.

The Dubai Court of First Instance gave S.S. the nine-month jail term earlier, but suspended the verdict on condition that the same crime is not repeated over the course of three years once the ruling becomes irrevocable.

The defendant's lawyer said he had poor mental health and was forced to retire from government service. "Medical reports confirm that he was being treated at the psychiatric ward of a government hospital," said his lawyer.


Gulf News Link (http://archive.gulfnews.com/articles/07/01/25/10099278.html)

[donpizmeov]

Fine management material. He should go far.

Don

[jetflite]

I've been doing some research about the culture in UAE,
for those of you who live there and have to abide by these rules... how real is it? I have a partner (not married) and if we are in dubai...how many of these relationship rules apply to ex pats???

For those fo you who live there...the non married guys..surely you would of had partners??? are all these rules dead serious....or do they get bent?

anyone who can shed some light on this topic...it would be greatly appreciated. As i don't live there, i can only gather information from what i read and from YOU who live there.. if a lot of this is true..it doesn't seem like an attractive place to live? If i can't hug or kiss my partner/hold hands etc.. :confused: :confused: :confused:

This is all from the UAE report: http://uaereport.homeblock.com/

1.)Islam is pretty much active in the UAE, all Islamic rules also count for Westerners. Having a "boy friend" or "girl friend" is 'not allowed'.

2.)Kissing or showing affection in a public is not allowed, you might get into prison. We were separated quite often, even in a hotel swimming pool:

3.)A rape case in the UAE can be turned against the raped woman:

[EK Snorkel]

For those fo you who live there...the non married guys..surely you would of had partners??? are all these rules dead serious....or do they get bent?


Just do not get caught ....:mad: If you get caught leave UAE ASAP....:ugh:

The UAE report you are mentioning is 99% correct but it fails to mention that Dubai has one of the most deadly roads in the world.

Furthermore the statement about low crime is not correct. Crime is widely spread but the officials are in denial. :yuk:

[Al Fakhem]

Another thing you will have to contend with is a bureaucracy bordering on the lunatic. The police force, in particular, seems to employ only the brainless and generally incompetent.

About three weeks ago, I found my car had been clamped whilst parked in a public parking area. When I contacted the police, they claimed the car was on their "wanted" list and they then proceeded to pick up the car and take it to a pound. They then conceded that all this happened due to a "computer problem" at their end, but I still do not have the car back owing to a sheer endless streem of paperwork that has to be completed.

I have yet to hear a single word of apology or any information regarding how victims of such a miscarriage of justice are compensated.

Folks, this place is the proverbial sh1thouse.

[Marooned]

Try also:

setting up a business, registering a newborn, buying a house/appartment with a mortgage and not dodgy cash, selling a house (inc new 1.5% transfer charges), getting a mortgage in the first place, registering a boat, launching a boat, having an accident (which is not your fault but still requires the full UAE paper trail) in fact anything that involves the authorities and affiliates thereof and you'll see why the UAE was ranked second to last place by the IMF for a country to do business... I think Uzbekistan was last... no offence to Uzbekistan.

[jetflite]

So far i haven't heard or read one good thing about the place...people have said it's great to VISIT....but not to live???? so why live there? yer the money's tax free...but f*ck.. no one sounds happy.. i'll be taking a rain check on my move there... don't exactly want to get there and be an un-happy ex pat who can get arrested for kissing, drinking, living with my partner. . . or live some where with no real system in place.. ??????? and by the sounds of things have to deal with arrogant nationals...

As i say... i don't live there, my partner does, and after reading all the post's on here... not too sure if i want to. So whats the go??? feel free to educate me...

[ruserious]

Jetflite, as bad as it has got here from an organisational point, you will not get arrested for kissing / living with your girlfriend unless you piss someone off. It does take a degree of local and cultural sensitivity to live well here and as bad as the traffic and greed have got, you can live quite peaceably with your girlfriend if you want. Yes its against the law, but they generally don't care.

[fractional]

by Andrew White & James Bennett from on line Arabian Business on Sunday, 06 May 2007
QUOTE
Working conditions of labourers in the emirate has increasingly attracted the attention of the world’s media.
Property giant Nakheel is to build a state-of-the-art facility to accommodate 10,000 labourers working on its flagship Palm, World, and Waterfront developments. The lodgings will boast full amenities and recreation facilities, and will be completed by the end of the year.
"Our new facility at Dubai Waterfront will hopefully set the new standard for labour accommodation," Chris O'Donnell, Nakheel's CEO, told Arabian Business at the Arabian Travel Market in Dubai last week.
UNQUOTE
Will it be?...

[dxbpilot]

Geez would you guys give it a rest? all anyone ever does is bitch about dubai on pprune...

Funny how many people complain and never do anything about it. If everything is so peachy back home why not move back ?

What did you think it was gonna be exactly the same as the west ?

Yes things can be a pain in the ass sometimes with paperwork (ie. go to typing !! ) but I have acually had some problems resolved alot quicker there than back in the west.

How can anyone complain about human rights in the UAE, have a look across the border at saudi !

Getting arrested for kissing/having a girlfriend ? come on guys !!?!!

Jetflite if you need any info pm me.

[fractional]

dxbpilot,
Where do you live? Perhaps you should try and depart you basic accommodation and experiment living a day or 2 with these other guys...
Credit to the UAE and other countries in treating their Guests better than in Saudi, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, etc., but don't be complacent. I don't treat my Emirati Guests that way.

[dxbpilot]

Where do these other guys live ? I thought it was in the dubai !

[4HolerPoler]

Good news for the EK boys.

Dubai's ruler has awarded a 63-year-old Pakistani gardener 50 000 Dirhams for always showing up to work on time during the 28 years he spent working in the emirate. The bonus Mohammad Nazier received was the equivalent of 49 months' pay from his job with the Gulf Arab state's municipal authority, Emirates Today newspaper said. "I had to take some loans to pay for my children's weddings and education. Now I will repay my debts... and keep some money for the future," said Nazier, who took sick leave only once to undergo surgery."This award means a lot to me. It is because of God's grace that I received it," said Nazier, a former soldier.

The poor sod deserves it, working for 28 years with a salary cap of 1,020 Dirhams.

Non-aviation, I know but I thought I'd remind you that Dubai really does care.:}

4HP

[fractional]

Indian expat lives valued at $9,500
Detail from a notice highlighting construction workers' rights, pictured on the back of a bus on 1 April 2006 in Dubai. (Chris Jackson/Getty Images)Treatment of expatriate Indians toiling in the UAE's construction industry may have been improving recently, but the army of workers are still considered overworked and undervalued.
Now the value of those workers has been calculated at AED35,000 ($9,500) by a life insurance company that is targeting the low paid Indian expat.
A new life insurance product called Overseas Indian Insurance Policy has been launched by The New India Assurance company that will pay out AED35,000 in the event of death by natural causes or due to an accident.
by Rob Corder, Arabian Business ON Line on Thursday, 17 May 2007

[fatbus]

So we will now see the workers ripped off even more

[fractional]

So we will now see the workers ripped off even more
It's a REAL SHAME:yuk: the way these guys are treated. What's amazing is the way this is overlooked by international organisations supposed to protect the defenceless. Money "talks"... and these guys are just... NOTHING.

[nolimitholdem]

From the Khaleej Times. Bold highlights are mine.

Single women too face eviction threat
By Preeti Kannan, Mary Nammour and Joy Sengupta

16 May 2007


DUBAI — Single women say they are hit equally hard by the Dubai Municipality's (DM) tough stance on bachelors.


The DM has been strictly enforcing its decision to shift out bachelors from certain localities of the city.

Housemaids and professional working women are all sailing in the same boat as landlords serve them with eviction notices.

Mariah Kouri, who was living alone in a Jumeirah accommodation till last week, was taken aback when she was suddenly asked to pack her bags and leave.

"I did not receive the DM notice. My landlord asked me to move out immediately. It was very harsh on me and other women living in my building. The DM had also cut power and water supply to our building for two days. Our landlord tried negotiating with the officials but it proved futile," Kouri said.

She added: "I don't think it's right to evict single women just because they are single. At least find us an alternative housing in a good area before shifting us out."

Saraswathi Ganesh, a housemaid, hasn't been asked to evict her accommodation yet. But she continues to live in fear as the eviction notice may come at any time. "We (she and her roommates) work very hard to make a living here. If they ask us to shift out, it will certainly affect our livelihood," said the anxious woman.

However, some of the landlords told Khaleej Times that they won't mind having single women as their tenants.

Michael Owens, a landlord who had to ask five of his women tenants to leave, said, "the Municipality has set strict regulations and we do not have a choice but to ask them to leave. The rules now clearly say that no single men or women can live in residential areas like Jumeirah, Umm Suqueim or Barsha."

According to Owens, the officials send a three-month notice to the landlords, who, at times, fail to communicate it to the tenant, who in turn is asked to leave at the end of the notice period. If the landlord fails to contact the Municipality, Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) steps in and cuts off power supply after a seven-day notice.

"Moreover, if you are getting new tenants they have to produce their marriage certificates before they sign the contract. After that the Municipality officials come and inspect the building," pointed out Owen.

Although several boards hanging outside such villas clearly say that accommodation is available only for families, the landlord, who requested anonymity said, "unlike single men and women, families do not prefer to live in single rooms in villas."

Senior officials of DM have confirmed that single women also fall under the bracket of bachelors and need to move out of residential areas.

Marwan Abdulla Al Mohammed, head of the Building Inspection Section under the Buildings Department of the Municipality said: "Single women also have to move out of the residential areas. They also have to shift to the areas earmarked for them."

Eng. Abdullah Al Hajri, Senior Manager, Corporate Communications and Occupational Health and Safety at Dewa, said that cutting off electricity connections was Dewa's last resort, after all other methods had proved futile in making the landlords address the problem.


Ahhh...Dubai, the City that Cares. Unless you're one of the workers that they've exploited to actually build the place. Then you're tossed out like the refugee you really are.

Every place on earth has its problems, its poor. But it's galling to see them promote Dubai like it's this progessive, modern place. wtf?

[EK Snorkel]

The rules now clearly say that no single men or women can live in residential areas like Jumeirah, Umm Suqueim or Barsha."



Well that raises a few questions, such as:

- What will happen to the approx. 2000 EK bachelors living in these areas?
- Bachelors who bought property in these areas?
- Bachelors who paid rent upfront for a year?
- etc.......

I continue to be flabbergasted by the low intellect and ability of local officials and managers. :ugh::ugh::ugh:

These clowns would like Dubai to be seen as a world capital but in reality it is a mediocre sand camp run by GESTAPO. :yuk::yuk:

rant over :mad:

[MTOW]

Single menTranslation into Gulf News-speak: Unaccompanied males from the Subcontinent or the Philippines living four or fourteen to a room.

[fractional]

http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/Traffic_and_Transport/10135919.html
Office workers in Dubai on average spend 12 minutes more on the road than their counterparts in Cairo.

[the Shue]

Is that after discount? :ooh:

[Fuzz Lightbeer]

Another interesting article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/01/world/middleeast/01dubai.html?bl&ex=1194062400&en=a040ad66e1b14f8c&ei=5087%0A

[SV4L]

for all pilots abroad not able to understand why sometimes we are upset in UAE or just to show the level of respect from the locals for all expatriates:uhoh:

Dubai and rape: French youth tells his storyBy Thanassis Cambanis The New York TimesThursday, November 1, 2007 Alexandre Robert, a French 15-year-old, was having a dream summer in this tourist paradise on the Gulf. It was Bastille Day, and he and a classmate had escaped the July heat at the beach for an air-conditioned arcade. Just after sunset, Alex was rushing to meet his father for dinner when he bumped into an acquaintance, a 17-year-old native-born student at the American school, who said he and his cousin could drop Alex off. There were, in fact, three Emirati men in the car, including a pair of former convicts, aged 35 and 18. They drove Alex past his house and into a dark patch of desert, between a row of new villas and a power plant, took away his cellphone, threatened him with a knife and a club and told him they would kill his family members if he ever reported them. Then, Alex says, they stripped off his pants and one by one sodomized him in the back seat of the car. They dumped Alex on the side of the road across from one of Dubai's luxury hotel towers. Alex and his family were about to learn that despite Dubai's status as the Arab world's paragon of modernity and wealth, its legal system remains a perilous gantlet when it comes to homosexuality and legal protection of foreigners. The authorities not only discouraged Alex from pressing charges, he says; they have left open the possibility of charging Alex with criminal homosexual activity, and neglected to inform him or his parents that one of his attackers had tested HIV positive while in prison four years earlier. "They tried to smother this story," Alex said by phone from Switzerland, where he fled a month into his 10th grade, fearing a jail term in Dubai if charged with homosexual activity. "Dubai, they say we build the highest towers, they have the best hotels. But all the news, they hide it. They don't want the world to know that Dubai still lives in the Middle Ages." United Arab Emirates law does not recognize rape of males, only a crime called "forced homosexuality." The two adult men charged with molesting Alex appeared in court Wednesday, and will face trial before a three-judge panel on Nov. 7. The third, a minor, will be tried in juvenile court. Men convicted of sexually assaulting other men usually serve sentences ranging from a few months to two years, legal experts here say. The two adults have pleaded not guilty to kidnapping with deceit and illicit sexual intercourse. Rape and assault are not unknown in Dubai, a bustling financial and tourist center where at least 90 percent of the residents are not Emirati citizens. Alex's Kafkaesque journey into the Dubai legal system brings into sharp relief questions about unequal treatment of foreigners that have long been quietly raised among the expatriate majority here. It also throws into public view the taboos surrounding HIV and homosexuality that Dubai residents say have allowed rampant harassment of gays and have encouraged the health system to treat HIV virtually in secret. (Under Emirates law, foreigners with HIV, or those convicted of homosexual activity, are deported.) Prosecutors here tout their system as modern, Western-style and fair. "The legal and judicial system in the United Arab Emirates makes no distinction between nationals and non-nationals," said Khalifa Rashid Bin Demas, head of the Dubai Attorney General's technical office, in an interview. "All residents are treated equally." Dubai's economic miracle - decades of double-digit growth spurred by investors, foreign companies, and workers drawn to the tax-free Emirates - depends on millions of foreigners, working jobs from construction to senior financial executives. Even many of the criminal court lawyers are foreigners, because there are not enough Emiratis. Lawyers here say that corporate law heartily protects foreign investors, but that equal protection before the law does not always extend to foreigners in criminal court. "Equality exists in theory, but not in practice," said a Western diplomat with close knowledge of the Dubai legal system. Alex's case has raised diplomatic tensions between the Emirates and France, whose government has lodged official complaints about the apparent cover-up of one assailant's HIV status and other irregularities in the case. Demas said that the police and prosecutors followed procedures, and that officials informed the victim's family of the assailant's HIV status as soon as they learned it. The Dubai authorities have no intention of prosecuting Alex for homosexual activity, Demas said, and are seeking the death penalty for the two adult attackers. "This crime is an outrage against society," Demas said. However, the investigation file in Alex's case and a pair of confidential French diplomatic cables obtained by The New York Times confirm the accounts of inexplicable and at times hostile official behavior described by Alex and his parents. "The grave deficiencies or incoherence of the investigation appear to result, in part, from gross incompetence of the services involved in the United Arab Emirates, but also from the moral, pseudo-scientific, and political prejudices which undoubtedly influenced the inquiry," the French ambassador to the United Arab Emirates wrote in a confidential cable dated Sept. 6. Most infuriating to Alex and his mother, Veronique Robert, they said, the police inaccurately informed French diplomats on Aug. 15, a month after the assault, that the three attackers were disease-free. Only at the end of August did the family learn that the 36-year-old assailant was HIV positive. The case file contains a positive HIV test for the convict dated March 26, 2003. "They lied to us," Robert said. "Now the Damocles sword of AIDS hangs over Alex." So far the teenager has not contracted HIV, but he will not know for certain until January, when he gets another blood test at the end of the disease's six-month incubation period. A forensic doctor examined Alex the night of the rape, taking swabs from his mouth for DNA and from his anus. He did not take blood tests or examine Alex with a speculum. Then he cleared the room and told Alex in private: "I know you're a homosexual. You can admit it to me. I can tell." Alex, outraged, said he told his father in tears: "I've just been raped by three men, and he's saying I'm a homosexual because my anus is distended." The doctor, an Egyptian, wrote in his legal report that he had found no evidence of forced penetration, according to Alex's family, an assessment that could hurt the case against the assailants. In early September, after the family learned about the older attacker's HIV status and the French government lodged official complaints with the UAE authorities, the Dubai attorney general's office assigned a new prosecutor to the case. Only then were forensic tests performed to confirm that sperm from all three attackers had been found in Alex's anus. Alex decided to stay in Dubai in order to testify against his attackers, and went back to school in September, despite unsettling flashbacks. In early October, however, the family's lawyer warned him that the authorities were weighing charges of homosexuality against Alex, which carry a prison term of one year. Veteran lawyers here say the justice system is evolving, like the country's entire system of governance, which has blossomed as the economy and population have exploded in just a few decades. Despite its shortfalls, the United Arab Emirates has combined Islamic values with best practices from the West to create "the most modern legal system among the Arab countries," said Salim Al Shaali, a former police officer and prosecutor who now practices criminal law. "We are very proud of what we've achieved," Shaali said. In business and finance, the UAE has worked hard to earn a reputation for impartial and speedy justice. But the criminal justice system has struggled, balancing a penal code rooted in conservative Arab and Islamic local culture, applied to an overwhelming non-Arab population of foreign residents. A 42-year-old gay businessman who would speak only if identified by his nickname, Ko, described routine sexual harassment by officials during his 13 years living in Dubai. Ko, an Australian of Asian origin who described himself as a "queen," said that his effeminate walk and tight clothes frequently attracted censure from police officers and labor and immigration officials, who would demand sex in exchange for not filing criminal charges or for issuing a work permit. He cut his shoulder-length hair to avoid attention, he said, but after years of living in fear of jail or deportation, he is selling his businesses and is leaving the country. "On the outside Dubai is beautiful, but on the inside it's still the third world," Ko said. "It's a dictatorship with a softer touch." Ko said violent rape was common, and that most foreign victims remained silent rather than face deportation or a prison term for homosexuality if they reported an assault. Although victims generally keep quiet, others who have been raped in Dubai have shared testimonials in recent days on boycottdubai.com, a Web site started by Veronique Robert as a result of her son's case. Prosecutors moved forward with the case against her son's attackers only as a result of public pressure and diplomatic complaints, Robert believes. Now, she hopes, the attention could prompt more humane and even-handed justice for future rape victims here. Alex says he wants to see his attackers executed or jailed for life, but he does not want to return to Dubai, no matter how crucial his appearance in court would be to the case. "Sometimes you feel crazy, you know?" he said. "It's hard, but we have to be strong. I'm doing this for all the other poor kids who got raped and couldn't do anything about it."
fly safe

[QNH1013]

What a Post! Ummm, sorry will read it later ya...