More than 45 foreign maids are facing execution on death row in Saudi Arabia, the Observer has learned, amid growing international outrage at the treatment of migrant workers.
The
startling figure emerged after Saudi Arabia beheaded a 24-year-old Sri
Lankan domestic worker, Rizana Nafeek, in the face of appeals for
clemency from around the world.
The
exact number of maids on death row is almost certainly higher, but
Saudi authorities do not publish official figures. Indonesians are
believed to account for the majority of those facing a death sentence. Human rights groups say 45 Indonesian women are on death row, and five have exhausted the legal process.
Figures
for other nationalities are harder to come by. Rights groups say they
believe there are also Sri Lankan, Filipina, Indian and Ethiopian maids
facing the death penalty.
Nafeek's
execution drew condemnation from Human Rights Watch and Amnesty
International, both of which have campaigned against the death penalty
in Saudi Arabia. They say many migrant domestic workers, drawn to the
Middle East by the prospect of employment with well-off families, face
abuse.
"Some
domestic workers find kind employers who treat them well, but others
face intense exploitation and abuse, ranging from months of hard work
without pay to physical violence to slavery-like conditions," said Nisha
Varia from Human Rights Watch. There are about 1.5 million foreign
maids in Saudi Arabia, including about 375,000 Sri Lankans.
An
International Labour Organisation report last week warned that an
estimated 52.6 million domestic workers around the world lack legal
rights and protections. But Varia said Saudi Arabia posed unique
problems because legal protections were weaker and the chance of access
to justice more remote.
"The
Saudi justice system is characterised by arbitrary arrests, unfair
trials and harsh punishments," she said. "Migrants are at high risk of
being victims of spurious charges. A domestic worker facing abuse or
exploitation from her employer might run away and then be accused of
theft. Employers may accuse domestic workers, especially those from
Indonesia, of witchcraft. Victims of rape and sexual assault are at risk
of being accused of adultery and fornication."
Migrants
are also said to struggle to gain access to lawyers and translators and
it is not uncommon, according to Human Rights Watch, for the Saudi
authorities to prevent those arrested from contacting their embassies.
Among
those awaiting execution is 40-year-old Satinah binti Jumadi Ahmad, an
Indonesian maid convicted of murdering her employer. According to Anis
Hidayah, executive director of Indonesian rights group Migrant Care, she
was arrested three months after arriving to work in Saudi Arabia in
September 2006. Three years later she called her family to tell them she
had been sentenced to death. Hidayah said the maid had killed her
employer, Noura al-Gharib, during an argument.
"She
was cooking in the kitchen and her employer screamed at her angrily.
Her employer grabbed her hair and tried to bang her head into the wall.
Satinah defended herself by spontaneously beating her employer with
bread dough and struck the nape of her neck and she fell down."
Other
reports say Satinah snapped after she was accused of stealing money and
that she had suffered regular abuse from her employer. The victim's
family has demanded 10m riyals (£1.6m) in blood money, which would save
Satinah. The Indonesian government says it is prepared to make a
payment, although the figure it is reported to have offered is
considerably lower than that demanded by the family. A moratorium was
placed on sending migrant workers to Saudi Arabia after an Indonesian
maid was beheaded in 2011.
Four
other women – Tuti Tursilawati binti Warjuki, Darmawati binti Taryani,
Siti Aminah and Siti Zaenab – are also on death row. Tursilawati, 27,
claims she killed her employer when he tried to rape her in 2010 after
months of sexual abuse. Zaenab was also convicted of killing her
employer, while Aminah and Taryani were sentenced to death for the
murder of another migrant worker.
In
2012 Saudi Arabia executed at least 69 people, says Human Rights Watch.
The previous year it executed at least 79, including five women, says
Amnesty International. The death toll included one woman beheaded for
witchcraft and sorcery.
Amnesty
said it had grown alarmed at the "disproportionate" number of migrant
workers in Saudi Arabia being executed. "As with Rizana Nafeek, nearly
all migrant workers in Saudi Arabia are at great risk if they end up in
the criminal justice system," said Amnesty's Saudi Arabia researcher,
Dina el-Mamoun.
"In many cases, they're subjected
to whole trials where they can't understand the proceedings, which are
conducted solely in Arabic, and without translation. They are often not
given access to lawyers or to consular assistance."
Mamoun said poor workers from the
Indian subcontinent, south-east Asia and Africa did not have the
contacts and influence needed to balance a justice system that was
weighted against them. "All countries should be advising their residents
who might be thinking of working in Saudi Arabia of the risks of
mistreatment in detention, of an unfair trial and even of execution. The
risks are very real and could be deadly." Amnesty said it knew of more
than 120 people – mostly foreign nationals – on death row.
Saudi
officials said that Rizana Nafeek was beheaded in public near Riyadh
last Wednesday. She had been sentenced to death for the murder of a baby
in her care, although she claimed that the child died as a result of a
choking accident.
The
Sri Lankan government reacted angrily and condemned the execution.
Members of the country's parliament observed a one-minute silence in her
memory. Her supporters had protested that she was only 17 at the time
of the child's death in 2005, and that international law prohibits the
execution of minors. It appears that a recruitment agency falsified the
age on her passport to allow her to travel to Saudi Arabia.
Sri
Lankan president Mahinda Rajapaksa had requested a stay of execution to
allow time for a financial settlement to be agreed with the family of
the child.
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