This month, Kuwait announced the formation of an ad-hoc committee to find ways of improving human rights within the country. The committee is composed of several departmental heads and seeks to improve human rights within the country through a variety of means. One of the goals of the newly established committee is to bolster cooperation with the United Nation (UN).

While the effort is a commendable first step, Kuwait still has several ways in which it can more closely adhere to international standards of human rights. Regarding the committee’s stated goal of more closely working with the UN, Kuwait still has not ratified several UN treaties. This blog post will briefly cover these treaties and highlight why Kuwait should immediately ratify them.

Kuwait has yet to ratify two UN treaties: the Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (CED) and the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Their Families (CMW). The CED seeks to prevent and criminalize instances of enforced disappearances, where individuals are arrested by government forces and then the arrestee’s whereabouts are kept secret from the public, their families, and their lawyers. The CMW seeks to protect migrant workers from discrimination and abuses within their employer’s country.

The reasoning for Kuwait’s reluctance may stem from their current ongoing actions that violate both treaties. The enforced disappearances of the Bidoon peoples of Kuwait put them in direct violation of the CED. When it comes to the CMW, Kuwait’s recent requirement of an exit visa for migrant workers puts them in violation of Article 8, which stipulates that migrant workers have a right to leave the country. Restrictions to this right are in the CMW, specifically restricting the right in cases where: it would violate law, are needed to protect national security, to secure public order, or to protect public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others. The rationale for Kuwait’s exit visa requirements is dubious at best and would likely not stand up to the further scrutiny from the international community that would come with ratifying the CMW.

If Kuwait is serious about improving human rights within the country through cooperation with the UN, Kuwait should immediately ratify both the CED and CMW. The ratification of both treaties would help rectify the ongoing human rights abuses in the country and protect some of the most vulnerable peoples within Kuwait. The people of Kuwait would only benefit from the ratification of the treaties.

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This post was originally published on Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain.