WORLD BRIDGE BLOG

At an open-air rally in Kuwait, Refugees International’s Maureen Lynch and I were escorted to the front of the seated gathering as honored guests. We were there in the country for an eight-day visit to assess the current circumstances under which Kuwait’s approximately 90,000 stateless persons, the Bidoon, are living. We also met with government officials, private-sector experts and advocacy groups to identify concrete actions to secure the Bidoon’s right to nationality in their own country.

Looking behind us in the audience that evening we saw a sea of men, perhaps 500 strong, all dressed in their long white dishdashas and distinctive Arab headdress. Speaker after speaker went up the podium to urge the Kuwaiti government to grant the Bidoon their basic human rights, including the right to citizenship. But the most powerful voices there that night did not make it to the podium. They belonged to the almost 200 women who were, according to custom, seated off to the side in the separate tented area, listening intently to the speakers while anxiously awaiting the chance to speak to the visitors from RI.

I felt compelled to join them. No sooner had I found a seat toward the back of the tent, when I was surrounded by a wall of women, all clad head-to-toe in black abaya and standing shoulder-to-shoulder in a circle that drew me into their stories and their lives. As soon as one woman would finish her story, she would leave the circle to make room for another. They were women of all ages – daughters and wives, mothers and grandmothers – and despite the covering that allowed us to look only into their eyes (many filled with tears) the women’s ability to communicate was clear, direct and profoundly moving.

The stories varied in detail but followed many of the same themes, all illustrating the daily hardships the Biddon face as “illegal residents” in their own land – denied the right to work, to access education and health care and to secure certificates that record births, marriages and deaths.

We spoke with Kuwaiti women who had married Bidoon men but had then felt compelled to seek a divorce out of desperation for their children, hoping that they might somehow be allowed to inherit their mother’s Kuwaiti nationality. Most of them are told to “just wait,” only to see that their cases are going nowhere. Many Bidoon women explained how their husbands had served in the Kuwaiti military and out of loyalty to “their country” had left families behind to fight in the Gulf War. When those men returned (often after having been held for months and/or tortured as POWs in Iraq), many discovered that their pensions and benefits had been withdrawn or suspended. One woman talked about being denied even the limited “Article 17" passport that might allow her to make the religious pilgrimage to Mecca.

Countless women spoke of being forced to put “false” nationalities on their children’s birth registration or health cards – “See this?” one mother of a disabled child asked. “They put ‘Saudi’ on this card, but my baby is not Saudi.” Another woman spoke of a friend who had twins. The authorities designated one twin as “Iraqi” and the other one as “Iranian.” Mothers spoke of their young adult children who see no way out other than suicide; other young people turn to crime or to the drug trade. A few of the young women we met told us of burns or other disfigurements which they are unable to have treated because of their inferior status as Bidoon and which they fear will prevent them from ever getting married or having children themselves. One woman in her twenties said, “We are young, but we have white hair because of this.”

The denial of basic rights and opportunities can affect every aspect of life for Bidoon women and their families. It is not uncommon to find three families sharing a house, often with more than thirty children between them – and many of their “houses” are nothing more than corrugated metal shacks. Yet despite the immense suffering they routinely endure, women we met spoke of their abiding hope for the future – the hope that one day soon they, their children and all their families will be guaranteed their basic rights and treated on a par with the “citizens” of Kuwait.

As we left the gathering that evening, several of the women pulled us aside to say, “Please promise us....promise that you will not forget us.” We have taken their stories back with us to support our advocacy efforts so that the wall of women who embraced us can finally be afforded their fundamental right to citizenship and the access to healthcare, education and livelihood that accompanies it.

Charlotte (Charlie) Ponticelli served as advisor to RI's recent mission to Kuwait. Previously, she was Senior Coordinator for International Women's Issues and Senior Advisor for Population, Refugees and Migration at the State Department and Deputy Under Secretary for International Affairs at the Department of Labor.