UAE envoy Al-Zaabi felicitates Pakistan on assuming ADD

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will take the command of Abu Dhabi Dialogue (ADD) and would play a important role in making the dialogue a vibrant organization as it caters to the interests of the labour and especially contractual labour mobility.

Well-placed diplomatic sources told The News here on Saturday that Pakistan would maintain close coordination with the ADD member countries for benefitting from the organization.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) ambassador for Pakistan Hamad Obaid Ibrahim Al-Zaabi played an important role in bringing Islamabad close to the dialogue held important meetings with the senior officials to streamline future relationship between Pakistan and the dialogue. Pakistan will soon be taking control of the organization for two years and the grand event would be hosted in the UAE capital and attended by all 20 members of the dialogue.

The 20 important countries, constituting the organization would put forth their expert opinions for the improvement of working of the ADD. The ADD is an initiative of the Colombo Process to establish dialogue between countries of origin and countries of destination. It is the first initiative of its type, designed to strengthen the management of contractual labour mobility.

The maiden ministerial consultation meeting hosted by the UAE was held three years ago. The orgnisation is working on “Contractual Labour Mobility in Asia: Key Partnerships for Development between Countries of Origin and Destination”. It highlighted the potential of contractual labour mobility to benefit overseas workers and the general development of both origin and destination countries. The follow up meetings were attended by senior officials where various were discussed and approved.

Ambassador Al-Zaabi has reminded that the ADD is a dialogue between the 11 Colombo Process countries/countries of origin (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam) and 9 countries of destination (Bahrain, Kuwait, Malaysia, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, UAE and Yemen). A high level meeting of the ADD recently took place to review the labour recruitment model and the need to tighten government oversight to ensure transparency and protect workers from exploitative practices, the need for harmonization of standards and skills of recruited workers, and the need for jobs to be filled. The senior officials recommended that the upcoming 4th Ministerial Consultation take up bilateral and multilateral cooperation to confront challenges of labour recruitment and consider alternative recruitment models. They also recommended bilateral and multilateral cooperation in skill recognition, certification, and development. The member states, some civil society actors including academics, NGOs and private sector representatives attend the thematic ADD meetings as observers. Relative to the Colombo Process, from which the ADD is derived, the organization is a more insular and close initiative, lacking considerable avenues for CSO engagement, the UAE envoy added. While felicitating Pakistan on assuming the charge of organization, Ambassador Hamad Obaid Ibrahim Al-Zaabi expressed the hope that ADD would put up its best performance under Pakistan.