‘Police are looking for three Asians for kidnapping a 26-year-old Ethiopian housemaid, reports Al-Anba daily. According to reports the suspects lay in wait for the victim and bundled her into their vehicle as she came out of the house to throw garbage in the bin in front of her house in Firdous. The maid has allegedly been taken to a vice den in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh and forced into prostitution. In a phone call to the sponsor the victim said she was being held captive by six men” (Arab Times March 10, 2010).

In order to curb crime in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh, I recommended in earlier articles published in Arab Times that the government should implement new and extraordinary security measures against culprits. I pointed out for example the illegality and inappropriateness of allowing the clustering of thousands of single expats in an area very close to families’ residences. The recent kidnapping crime allegedly committed by three Asian men who reside in Al-Jleeb is yet another reminder that this area, at least some sections of it, is turning into clusters of vice dens.

As such, introducing “extraordinary security measures” to deal with high crime rates in Al-Jleeb Area is a step in the right direction. Such measures can take the form of either dividing the area into separate security zones or effectively stopping the leasing of small rooms to undocumented individuals. In addition, the Interior Ministry in cooperation with the Ministry of Social Affairs and other relevant government’s agencies can check the real causes of why such vice dens are sometimes difficult to discover. This may have happened due to lack of data, fake addresses, thugs’ control of residential complexes, etc.

  Though, there is nothing illegal or wrong with the actual area of Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh or with renting apartment to single expats. However, what seemed to have happened is that the area is gradually transforming into clusters of illegal accommodations of single men. Such accommodations are illegal according to housing laws in Kuwait. For example, according to Kuwait’s law, it is illegal to lease rooms, apartments...etc in residential areas-family residence- to single men, whether expats or citizens. Yet, due to the lack of effective follow up policies, the situation seemed to have escalated in Al-Jleeb. It is common in Al-Jleeb these days to find more than five individuals living in small, overcrowded rooms without proper ventilation and sanitation. And such chaotic accommodations make it easy for thugs and rapists to disappear without a trace.

 Above all, such kind of criminal behavior, kidnapping housemaids and forcing them into prostitution by some criminals is a direct attack on our national security. Such crimes do not just distort the image of Kuwait, but clearly help distort the image of its hard working expats. What we are facing in Al-Jleeb is an unprecedented rise in crimes effecting our local and expatriate communities — forced prostitution, brewing and selling of poisonous liquor and various other crimes. Unless we do what is necessary in regard to the situation in Al-Jleeb; uprooting crime, this area will deteriorate into mayhem.

khaledaljenfawi@yahoo.com