In a fresh bid to rescue the Sri Lankan housemaid Rizana Nafeek, who was sentenced to death after killing a baby in her care, Sri Lankan External Affairs Minister appealed to his Saudi counterpart to grant her pardon on humanitarian grounds.
The maid has been imprisoned for the past seven years. After her conviction, her fate lies in the hands of the aggrieved parents.
Three weeks ago, Sri Lanka’s Attorney General Palitha Fernando and Additional Foreign Secretary Ibrahim Sahib Ansar met the Riyadh Deputy Governor Prince Mohammed bin Saad bin Abdulaziz and Attorney General As Sheikh Mohamed Bin Fahd Al -Abdullah to discuss Nafeek’s case. The Sri Lankan officials were on an official mission to the capital.
Sri Lanka’s Justice Minister Rauf Hakeem, said yesterday that the whole country is eagerly waiting for the day when Nafeek is released from prison. The island comprising Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims are praying for clemency from the parents of the deceased child.
Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa also made an appeal for clemency to the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah.
On June 16, 2007, Nafeek was sentenced to death by a three-member bench at the Dawadmi High Court for killing the baby she was entrusted to look after in the absence of her Saudi employers at home. The accused maintained that the newborn choked during bottle-feeding, and that she tried to seek help.
In August last year, the Royal Court forwarded the case of Nafeek for an amicable settlement with the Saudi parents of the child she was convicted of killing. Nafeek’s case is being taken up by the Reconciliation Committee (RC) of the Riyadh governorate, whose members were currently negotiating with the parents of the deceased child.
The RC members usually approach the plaintiff to negotiate a pardon for the accused. Such negotiations are either settled with the payment of blood money or a graceful pardon from the aggrieved parties.
“There is no set period for the RC to take a decision; negotiations may take weeks or sometimes several months to settle a case,” sources from the governorate said.
Legal experts in the Kingdom say Nafeek can only be saved if pardoned by the victim’s family. The pardon can be offered with or without a request for blood money.
Kifaya Ifthikar, a social worker who visited Nafeek recently, said the maid feels confident that someone would help her get out of jail.
“I am sure some good-hearted people would influence the parents to grant me a pardon and release me from jail,” Nafeek had told Ifthikar.
The incident, in which the infant died, had occurred on May 22, 2005, while Nafeek was bottle-feeding the infant.
In her statement to the court, Nafeek claimed that at the time of her arrival in Saudi Arabia, she was 17 years old. She said a recruitment agent had falsified her documents and obtained her passport by over-stating her true age by six years.
The Colombo High Court recently sentenced the two agents to two years of imprisonment in Colombo, for faking the original travel documents of Nafeek. The judge sentenced the two accused to pay Rs 120,000 (SR 3,500) each to the parents of Nafeek as penalty for their offense.
Attempts to save Sri Lankan housemaid from death row
