United Arab Emirates: Protect Migrant Workers from Religious Profiling, Arbitrary Detention, and Deportation
Statement by Equidem
“We have been abandoned twice, once by the country we worked in, and once by the country we belong to. I lost not just my job, but my hope too. There is no certainty waiting for me, and I do not know what to do or where to begin.”
— Mohammad Malik, a Pakistan national who had worked in the United Arab Emirates for the last ten years until his deportation
The mass detention and deportation of thousands of migrant workers, predominantly from religious minority communities, by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in May 2026 marks a dangerous escalation in the treatment of migrant workers amid the recent regional conflict in the Gulf. According to Shia Muslim Pakistani nationals interviewed by Equidem, UAE government authorities conducted security operations targeting migrant workers on the basis of religion or perceived political affiliation. These workers reported being detained and deported without individualised evidence of wrongdoing, meaningful explanation, or access to due process. Media outlets have separately reported similar treatment of Shia Muslims deported from the UAE.
All nine Shia Muslim Pakistani nationals interviewed by Equidem reported attending Imam Bargah, a Shia mosque located in Bur Dubai. They described that upon entering the mosque, security personnel scanned their Emirates ID cards. Police officers subsequently confirmed to the workers, at the point of arrest, that they had been identified and tracked through these mosque ID scans. Some workers were arrested at their workplaces, while others were instructed by their employers to report to a police station. When questioned, workers stated they had attended the mosque solely for prayer and had not engaged in any wrongdoing — a fact the police did not dispute.
Workers also reported that others deported on the same flights had similarly been tracked through Emirates ID scans at the Imam Bargah. Such practices — the systematic collection of identity data at places of worship and its use to detain and deport individuals on the basis of their religious attendance — constitute violations of the rights to privacy, equality, freedom of religion, due process, and protection from discrimination. Public safety cannot be protected through discriminatory targeting, arbitrary detention, torture or ill treatment, surveillance, and mass deportation of migrants. At a time of regional conflict, migrant workers must be protected from abuse, not treated as expendable collateral in geopolitical tensions.
Deportation as Wage Theft
This crisis cannot be separated from the kafala or employer sponsorship system that governs much of labour migration in the UAE. Under this system, a migrant worker’s legal status, residence, and ability to remain in the country are often tied to an employer or sponsor. This creates a profound imbalance of power, restricting workers’ ability to challenge abuse, recover wages, change jobs, organise collectively, or seek remedy without fear of retaliation.
In the UAE and across the Gulf, migrant workers sustain homes, roads, airports, offices, hotels, transport systems, delivery networks, logistics chains, and service industries. Many have worked there for years, and in some cases decades, building livelihoods that support host economies as well as families and communities in countries of origin.
For many workers, migration is financed through debt, including recruitment fees, visa-related costs, transport expenses, and other charges incurred to secure employment. In this context, sudden detention and deportation do not merely remove workers from the country. They can strip workers of income, savings, unpaid wages, end-of-service benefits, personal belongings, and the practical ability to pursue claims against employers, subcontractors, or recruitment intermediaries.
In these circumstances, deportation can function as a form of wage theft and economic dispossession.
Worker Testimonies and Allegations of Abuse
Equidem spoke with nine migrant workers who had returned to Pakistan and other countries after being deported from the UAE. Their accounts raise serious allegations of arbitrary detention, torture or ill-treatment, denial of due process, and deportation without meaningful explanation.
Musadaq*, who spoke to Equidem, had worked as a driver for Safari Tourism for 13 years. He said he was detained by police at the Mall of the Emirates, his hands were placed behind his back, and he was held at gunpoint for six hours in a jail at the mall. He was then moved to Al-Warsan prison, where he said he was stripped naked and tortured for four days. He believes he may have been drugged after losing consciousness shortly after drinking tea given to him. After nearly two weeks in detention, he was deported.
Hussain*, who also spoke to Equidem, had worked in the UAE for Amazon Delivery for three years. He said he was on duty when his employer instructed him to report to the police station, where he was arrested. He told the authorities that he worked for Amazon and had invested around 15,000 dirhams (approximately USD 4,084), in his visa and licence, but said this was disregarded. After 12 days in detention, he was deported. He has still not received his April salary.
Other workers reported that they were employed through subcontracting arrangements for multinational companies and are now unable to recover wages and other entitlements owed to them. Their cases show how deportation can make labour violations effectively irreversible: once workers are removed from the country, they are cut off from the workplaces, employers, subcontractors, documents, witnesses, and legal processes through which they might otherwise seek payment, accountability, or remedy.
This is why the crisis must be understood not only as a question of mass deportation, but as a crisis of state responsibility, corporate accountability, and labour rights. Migrant workers in the Gulf already work within a labour migration regime that gives them limited control over their employment, residence, mobility, and ability to organise collectively. Access to trade unions, independent worker support, collective bargaining, and effective grievance mechanisms is often restricted, absent, or controlled by the very employers and intermediaries workers may need to challenge.
In this context, arbitrary detention and deportation deepen an already unequal system of labour control, cutting workers off from wages, legal processes, and the limited pathways to remedy that may have been available to them.
Demands: Immediate Protections, Remedy, and Structural Reform
Equidem calls for urgent action to protect affected workers, ensure accountability, and address the structural conditions that created this crisis.
Demands to the Government of the United Arab Emirates
1. Immediate Protection and Due Process
The Government of the United Arab Emirates must immediately halt all arbitrary, discriminatory, and unlawful detention and deportation of migrant workers.
UAE authorities must ensure that every affected worker has access to legal representation, interpreters, consular support, family contact, medical care, and the ability to challenge detention or deportation orders.
The UAE must also end any use of religious profiling, biometric surveillance, or identity-tracking mechanisms to target migrant workers on the basis of religion, nationality, migrant status, or perceived political affiliation.
2. Investigation and Accountability
The UAE must establish an independent and transparent investigation into allegations of torture, ill-treatment, coercion, religious profiling, biometric surveillance, arbitrary detention, and denial of due process.
Any state officials, institutions, employers, recruitment agencies, subcontractors, or intermediaries found responsible for abuse, discriminatory targeting, or unlawful removal must be held accountable.
3. Wage Recovery, Compensation, and Remedy
The UAE must ensure that all affected workers are able to recover unpaid wages, end-of-service benefits, savings, personal belongings, passports, identity documents, and any other entitlements owed to them.
Deportation must not be used to erase employer obligations or deny workers access to remedy. Where workers have suffered unlawful detention, abuse, loss of income, unpaid wages, or forced removal, they must have access to compensation, rehabilitation, and justice.
4. Long-Term Structural Reform
Beyond the immediate crisis, the UAE must reform the kafala system and the wider structures of labour migration that leave migrant workers dependent on employers, subcontractors, and recruiters for their residence, mobility, employment, wages, documents, and access to justice.
Such reforms must also guarantee freedom of association, access to independent worker representation, protection from discrimination, effective grievance mechanisms, and enforceable routes to remedy, including during moments of crisis.
Responsibility of Countries of Origin
Countries of origin whose nationals have been affected must take immediate action to protect their citizens.
This includes documenting cases, providing consular and legal assistance, supporting affected families, demanding information from UAE authorities, and helping workers recover wages, savings, belongings, documents, and other entitlements.
Countries of origin must also seek remedies for workers who have been unlawfully detained, mistreated, or deported. Diplomatic sensitivities must not override the rights, dignity, and safety of migrant workers.
Responsibility of Employers, Subcontractors, Recruitment Agencies, and Multinational Companies
Employers, subcontractors, recruitment agencies, and multinational companies operating in the UAE must identify whether workers in their operations or supply chains have been detained, deported, or otherwise affected. They must ensure that all outstanding wages, benefits, and end of-service payments are paid in full, and that workers’ documents, belongings, and savings are returned.
Companies benefiting from migrant labour must not remain silent when the workers who sustain their operations are targeted, abused, or expelled. They must provide remedy where workers were abandoned, harmed, or left without income, including in cases involving subcontracted workers.
Role of International Institutions and Human Rights Mechanisms
UN human rights mechanisms, the International Labour Organization, migrant rights bodies, trade unions, and civil society organisations must closely monitor the situation and call for accountability. This crisis reflects deeper structural failures in Gulf labour migration systems, including sponsorship-based dependency, restrictions on organising, weak grievance mechanisms, lack of enforceable anti-discrimination protections, and the absence of meaningful remedy for migrant workers.
International institutions must press for immediate protection, independent investigation, wage recovery, compensation, and long-term reform of labour migration systems across the Gulf.
Conclusion
The treatment of migrant workers in the UAE must not be normalised as an unavoidable consequence of regional conflict. Moments of conflict test the responsibility of governments, employers, and international institutions. Even where security concerns are invoked, the rights, wages, and dignity of migrant workers must not be treated as disposable. Those who build and sustain economies, yet have the least power within them, should not be forced to bear the consequences of political decisions and conflicts over which they have no control.
We call on governments, employers, international institutions, trade unions, and civil society to act urgently to protect affected workers, secure wage recovery and remedy, investigate abuses, and ensure that migrant workers are not abandoned or expelled without accountability in moments of geopolitical crisis.
