300 Nepalis trapped in Baghdad

Around three hundred Nepalis who reached Iraq lured by high-paying jobs are marooned in violence-wrecked capital Baghdad, reports Kantipur Daily.

Some 150 Nepalis from Myagdi, Nawalparasi, Chitwan, Jhapa, Syangja and Nuwakot districts who reached the war-torn country after being promised lucrative jobs by a Nepali agent working in Baghdad located Yartho Hotel and 135 more Nepalis who arrived here later to work in Global Security located in the city are not even given any lodging and proper food because of which they are forced to live in the streets with open sky as their roof nearby the highly unsafe Baghdad Airport, the daily said.

Among the stranded Nepalis one Harka Bahadur Thapa of Myagdi told Kantipur by phone that they have been given only one meal a day consisting of two breads from the past one week. He said their problem has been further compounded by the fact that there are no toilets and the Iraqi police guarding them don't even allow them to go to the nearby hotel for it.

The owner of Yartho Hotel has been saying that he won't employ the Nepali workers as per the contract until Nagendra Puri and Chiranjivi Sharma come and pay him $ 40,000 they owe to him.

After the Nepalis started to pelt stone at the hotel in rage, US army and Iraqi police rounded them up and barred their movement beyond the open street in front of the hotel.

Currently, around 40 Iraqi police are guarding the Nepalis.

"Please sir, we don't have money, we are stranded here and don't know what to do…we are dying of hunger…please rescue us," one another Nepali said calling from the same cell phone Thapa had used to call the paper. The paper said that he was crying as he was talking over the phone while confused noises accentuated with cries and hoarse scolding in Iraqi language could be heard from the background.

The victimised Nepalis said they paid upto Rs 3,00,000 to come to Iraq after the agents promised them of very high-paying jobs. They said that the Nepalis agents who had brought them here are out of contact. They have even been warned by the agents not to disclose their name and man-power agencies they work for or their throats will be slit. nepalnews.com ag July 09 08