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Article

9 Nov 2017

Author:
Guy Mannes-Abbott, Middle East Eye

Louvre Abu Dhabi: A memorial to forced labour?

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...[T]he Louvre Abu Dhabi (LAD) is being heralded... [as] an architectural and engineering achievement, but can or should a cultural institution of this kind, in particular, be built under conditions of forced labour in 2017?...The problem is simple; the thousands of men who made this possible, who deployed the exactitude with their bodies and hands, were migrant construction workers entrapped by worthless contracts and recruitment debts, then forced to live under often appalling conditions. These facts are not disputed; even government-paid monitors reported in mid-construction that 86 percent of workers carried recruitment debts...[LAD architect Jean] Nouvel claims to have checked conditions that [migrants] live and work under and saw "nothing" of concern...In these camps, you will hear testimony...detailing cruel hours, violent working conditions, real entrapment by debt, and fear about raising voices...Testimony like this contributed to the ILO complaint about forced labour in Abu Dhabi which generated minor law changes in 2016...