RIYADH, 1 February 2004 — Tragedy has struck two families thousands of kilometers apart, one from Bangladesh and the other from Bosnia. The cause of their distress is the same — their nearest and dearest are missing in Saudi Arabia.
In the case of the Bangladeshi family, the son is reported missing in Riyadh. The second case concerns a Bosnian national, Savic Cvijan, who, according to his daughter, Cvijanka Veljovic, came to Saudi Arabia from Malta some 15 years ago and has not been heard of since.
According to Raina Abu Zafar, an English-language teacher at the Health Ministry’s institute in Riyadh, the Bangladeshi family in Dhaka are in emotional crisis over the disappearance of Amir Qaiser, who is supposed to be working in Riyadh.
The missing man’s father recently suffered a stroke and lost his memory. But attempts to contact the son and inform him have drawn a blank. His whereabouts remain unknown.
In an e-mail to Arab News asking for help, Abu Zafar’s son Raiyan said that the father’s second wife, Samira Qaiser, who had flown in from the US just before his stroke, has now had to stay on while attempts to find Amir Qaiser continue.
She has had to sell all her belongings and gold to meet the cost of living in Bangladesh as neither she nor her husband have any relatives in the country.
“I appeal to Arab News to help us find our son, Aamir Qaiser ... he should come back immediately and help us out,” Raiyan quoted Samira Qaiser as saying.
In the other case, Veljovic, who currently works as a nurse in Sombor, in the Serbian province of Voivodina, has sought Arab News’ help in tracing her father, Savic Cvijan, who, she believed, had embraced Islam and settled down in Saudi Arabia after traveling from Malta.
She said that a relative told her that he was in Saudi Arabia. She thought that he had visited Makkah and Madinah but maybe with a changed name.
