KUWAIT - Secretary General of the Supreme Planning and Development Council Dr. Khaled Mahdi said on Wednesday that Kuwait is continuously seeking to overhaul legislations concerning expatriate workers with the aspiration TO set up "a smart system" to regulate bringing in the foreign laborers.

Mahdi, in a statement marking launch of the report of the 2023 International Development Bank, indicated that mechanisms would be set up to test professional skills of the workers that would be allowed into the country.

Notions incorporated in the aspired strategy include specifying areas where the workers are highly needed with priority for building a lucrative work environment for the citizens namely the young Kuwaitis who should be employed in the private sector.

A planned online platform will screen potential employed workers from abroad to ensure the newcomers are qualified to perform the job chosen for them. "It does not make sense that a truck driver in his home country turns into an engineer in the host state!," he sarcastically remarked alluding to some of such cases.

He called for establishing an agency for hiring the foreign expatriates in the private sector.

Meanwhile, member of the national human rights diwan, Dr. Abdulredha Asiri said in a separate statement that the department advocates protecting rights of citizens and expatriates.

The resident representative of the World Bank in Kuwait, Ghassan Al-Khojeh, indicated that authorities of the expatriates' home countries should have well-studied systems to regulate dispatch of laborers to work abroad.

The head of the International Migration Organization in Kuwait, Mazen Abulhessen, said recommendations incorporated in the report are in harmony with the international convention for mogration and the IMO strategy for the Gulf.

Nisrin Rebaiaan, the representative of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said the WB "has invited us to be part of the consultative commission tasked with recently issued report on the immigrants and refugees." The recommendations in the report show how refugees can contribute to constructive and sustainable development in the host country, rather than turning into a burden for the community where they have chosen to work other than their countries.

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