NYU SAYS THAT THE UAE EXECUTIVE AUTHORITY — WHICH WILL OWN AND CONSTRUCT THE NYU ABU DHABI CAMPUS — HAS PROMISED THAT LABOR ABUSES WON’T OCCUR. ISN’T THAT ENOUGH?
No. Only a legally binding, enforceable and public commitment from NYU will guarantee the protection of migrant workers’ basic human rights at NYU Abu Dhabi and all future branch campuses. The fact that the UAE Executive Authority will construct and own the campus buildings only heightens concerns about the labor standards employed there. As Human Rights Watch has extensively documented, migrant workers in Abu Dhabi are badly exploited and the UAE government has faced difficultly in remedying labor abuses. The UAE construction boom has been so sudden that even if the government were willing to protect migrant workers, the existing UAE governmental agencies responsible for enforcing these labor protections are both understaffed and underempowered. For more information on migrant construction worker rights abuse and UAE governmental response, please visit: http://hrw.org/englishwr2k8/docs/2008/01/31/uae17622.htm. The Coalition for Fair Labor believes that only an external, third party mo
