Lost children arrive home after years as camel jockey slaves [View All]

[emad]

July 09, 2005

Lost children arrive home after years as camel jockey slaves
From Zahid Hussain in Islamabad



CLAD in filthy clothes with their identity cards hanging from their necks, dozens of Pakistani children who had been smuggled to the United Arab Emirates to work as camel race jockeys returned home yesterday.

The 86 children, aged between 4 and 12, had lived a life of virtual slavery for up to seven years, before being traced by welfare groups.

Some were so traumatised that they could not remember their names or where they were from. No relatives or guardians turned up at the airport in Lahore to welcome the long-lost children, who were repatriated under an agreement between the UN Children’s fund and the governments of Pakistan and the UAE.

Most of the children do not know who their parents are, and there is little hope of their ever being reunited.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,175-1686458,00.html