Arab versus Asian migrant workers in the GCC countries

part of the United Nations Secretariat. * * Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland. A difficult economic situation of many Arab and South East Asian countries in the last few decades has made labor emigration an attractive option for citizens of these states (Al-Najjar, 2001; Abella, 1995). 1 Such emigration has generally been supported by the governments of these countries to ease the pressure on labor markets, reduce unemployment, and accelerate development. The migration of the workforce has become one of the most dynamic economic factors in the Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) countries; remittances from migrant labor back to these states exceed the value of regional trade in goods as well as official capital flows (Nassar and Ghoneim, 2002; Fergany, 2001). Similarly, the migrations to the Gulf states speed up the development of certain regions of India,