The latest major labor strike in the Gulf tore through Sharjah on March 18, 2008. At a maintenance company 1,500 migrant workers burned busses and cars, and smashed up the company’s administration office. Some of the workers told Gulf News they were rioting over low and unpaid wages. Riot police were called in, and the unrest eventually quelled. These scenes have become common events in the Gulf. In February and March of this year, Dubai and Bahrain saw strikes that halted construction on billion dollar projects. In perhaps the most high profile strike just a few months earlier, in October 2007 thousands of workers on the Burj Dubai, soon to be the tallest building in the world, went on strike, then rioted, destroying the site office of Dubai construction firm Emaar. Like all GCC countries, the UAE and Bahrain prohibit labor unions. Strikes are legal in Bahrain, but prohibited in
