Pregnant and Punished in the UAE Our World

would have been proud of. Both on and off the pitch, they are a club

with quite a story. Now on BBC News it's time for

Our World. This footage was filmed secretly in

the United Arab Emirates. The woman in green is on trial. Her feet are

chained. Her alleged crime? Sex outside marriage. In the UAE, that

can land you in prison. Women are being trapped by the

UAE's laws, especially the migrant workers. Tens of thousands of women

believe there is an opportunity for them in the UAE and they don't know

what is awaiting them and that is what is really scary. Many stay

silent through fear. But in a year-long investigation, we have

tracked down women around the world who are brave enough to speak out.

This is their story. Dubai, a place of sunshine and

opportunity. Many women come looking for a better life. 90% of the

population in the UAE is foreign. But they can find themselves trapped

by the country's strict Sharia -based laws on sex outside

marriage. Marie travelled to Dubai to work as a domestic helper. We

have changed her name to protect her identity. After four years, she met

a local man. Still unmarried, she had two

daughters with her boyfriend. But that is a crime under the country's

strict laws of Zina. Even though Marie had committed a

crime, her boyfriend's family welcomes them into their home until

a friend intervened. The family decided that Marie and

her daughters should return home to the Philippines. But she had left

her first employer without permission, breaking the country's

laws which give bosses exclusive rights to their workers. And the

employer still have her passport -- had. So the only way Marie could try

to leave the country was to hand herself over to the authorities.

Marie was put on trial. Like the vast majority of domestic workers

who have to face the law, she couldn't afford a lawyer.

The judge found Marie guilty of breaking both the Zina laws and the

working laws and sentenced her two months in jail with her two

daughters. She said prison life was harsh. -- three months.

The Zina laws prohibiting sex outside marriage apply to everyone

in the UAE. But it is overwhelmingly women who are caught because

pregnancy is proof the law has been broken. Local women often resort to

illegal abortions to avoid being punished. But women migrant workers

can often be trapped by the work system, even if they have been

raped. This woman left her home in Bangladesh for a job as a domestic

helper in the UAE. One day, she was alone in the family

home when she says her employer raped her.

After her ordeal, she was trapped in her employer's home. Under the work

system, she couldn't leave without his permission. Then her situation

got worse. The pregnancy meant that both she

and her employer were in danger of prosecution under the country's Zina

laws. Her employer sent her back to Bangladesh.

Once she was back in Bangladesh, she had an abortion. She never reported

the alleged rape. Experts in the UAE's legal system stress that

that's -- that the Zina laws are not meant to punish women who have been

raped. The UAE is not the only country in

the region to criminalize sex outside marriage. But human rights

campaigners believe it's high number of migrant workers means more abused

women are being trapped and the authorities should act. They need to

decriminalize consensual sexual relations. This would then lift off

the possibility that victims could be prosecuted and allow them to lay

claims. Then you need to ensure that those who end up as victims are in a

situation where they are not vulnerable. In recent years, many of

the most vulnerable women in the UAE have sought help from a committed

campaigner. This is the house, come on in. She transformed her house

into a shelter for abused women and children.

This is a room where there are up to three beds. It is very comfortable.

Well, if she comes to me and she is pregnant, I get her an examination

and a ghetto somebody, a midwife to come and visit on a regular basis,

and I try to turn a negative into a positive. Can I speak to a lawyer

and he handles it the best way that he can. The problem is that if they

end up being hauled in by the sponsor, pregnant and being accused

of something, the scenario is not so good. Usually she will go to jail.

She says she helped up to 3000 women and children between 1991 and 2008.

Every case of a woman that had been physically abused or raped or

unpaid, I felt it. I am American, I came into religion, and what

inspired me was you have to be responsible for your neighbours. In

the house would be full, and I would just say, please, please expand the

walls. And I think he did. I don't know how we got 70 women in that

house, but somehow we did. Somehow, every single day there was chicken

coming to the door. Somehow there was enough a before Miller, enough

volunteers. Somehow, somehow, somehow. After many years of helping

women in the UAE, she was advised to leave the country. She now lives in

America but remains a passionate believer in the rights of the UAE's

vulnerable women. We have some amazing amazing authorities in these

countries, some great people and great leaders who are very worldly

and open-minded and educated. If they only just understood what the

details of this victim's life were they would be appalled and they

would say, enough is enough. But they don't. Why? Because there is

this Shhhh. Some women are pushed to such extremes that they can't keep

quiet. Monica had a job as a domestic worker in Abu Dhabi. She

says that one day she found herself alone in the house with her

employer's driver. Like many victims, Monica did not

feel able to report the alleged rape. She lived in fear, trapped in

the house. To make things worse, she discovered she was pregnant. She

could now be punished for sex outside marriage.

In spite of the alleged rape and the pregnancy, under her contract,

Monica still needed her employer's permission to leave.

But she had one last chance to escape. She had a secret cellphone

hidden in the kitchen. She used it to call a popular radio show back

home in the Philippines. She appealed for help live on-air.

As a result of Monica's desperate appeal, the Philippines government

intervened. They put diplomatic pressure on the UAE to let her go

home. When she arrived in Manila, the

first person she called was her husband. Neither he nor her family

knew that she had been raped or that she was pregnant. We filmed with her

shortly after she told them. A few weeks after our interview,

Monica had a baby boy. There are no official figures available, but we

estimate that hundreds of vulnerable women are being caught by the UAE's

laws every year. They are either victims of abuse or end up in prison

for consensual sex outside marriage. The problem is that every

single year tens of thousands of women are migrating, leaving behind

their kids, their homes, and they are leaving because they believe

there is an opportunity for them to make money and save money and they

don't know what is awaiting them. That is what is really scary.

We made repeated requests to the UAE authorities over many months for an

interview on the laws on sex outside marriage, but received no response.

In the last few days they have issued a statement stressing

that... The UAE's legal system is based on

Sharia law. Many people here believe those laws are fair and appropriate.

The UAE promotes itself as a land of opportunity, but for many of its

women, especially migrant workers, there is a darker side. The story of

how women are falling foul of the UAE's laws has been largely untold

until now. It is about a clash between the country's Conservative

traditions and the human rights of the women who help to grow. It is a

challenge, because Islamic leave they have every right. If this is

your law, this is your law. But the same time, if this is your law and

you are Muslim and you things run Islamic leave, then this is a

challenge. How do you do that? You have to draw the line, I'm not

sure. Monica still lives in the Philippines with her family. Marie

lives near Manila with her two children. Their father has not been

in contact. This woman died of leukaemia on the 21st of April on.

18 degrees makes it very mild through the day on Friday.

And we keep that mild theme through the day, both Saturday and Sunday.