Lebanon asks Philippines to lift ban

Lebanon's honorary consul in the Philippines on Thursday asked Manila to allow job-seekers into Lebanon and end a two-year ban, saying it was now safe for them to work there.

Joseph Assad said normality had returned to troubled Beirut after the May 2008 presidential election.

"We should not compare Lebanon with Iraq, which has a travel ban, because Lebanon is not in a state of war. On the contrary, Lebanon is booming today despite the world economic crisis," Assad told reporters.

"The ban on Filipino travel to Lebanon is not helping either country. It is rather harming many families in Lebanon who need help and those in the Philippines who need jobs," said Assad, a Filipino of Lebanese descent who acts as Beirut's representative here.

Manila, one of the world's largest labour-exporting nations, imposed the travel ban in 2006 amid fighting between Hezbollah gunmen and the Israeli armed forces.

Some 6,000 Filipino workers were repatriated but officials have said more than 30,000 others had remained there, mostly domestic helpers.

Assad said that despite the ban, Lebanese records showed that more than 43,000 Filipinos had defied their government and gone to work in Lebanon since 2006.

Although these workers say there is no longer any security threat, Manila is concerned over the lack of laws protecting migrant workers from potential abuse and harassment by employers.

Assad said he would look into complaints that many Lebanese employers were not paying their workers the required minimum salary of $333 (Dh1,225) a month.

Some eight million Filipinos, or nearly 10 per cent of the country's population, work abroad. Remittances they send home are a major pillar of the domestic economy.