Indonesian workers face execution in Saudi Arabia
Indonesian workers face execution in Saudi Arabia
JAKARTA (JP): Two Indonesian migrant workers in Saudi Arabia
may face the death penalty if found guilty of murder.
The Ministry of Manpower's director general of labor
placement, Jack Iskandarsyah, said that Dimiyati Usro and another
unnamed Indonesian were currently on trial for murder.
Dimiyati is accused of murdering his wife and his employer's
parents, while the other Indonesian is charged with bludgeoning
his employer to death.
Jack could not provide extensive details about the cases or
the name of the labor contractor which took the two to Saudi
Arabia.
"It could have been PT Abul Pratama," Jack said when asked
about Dimiyati's labor contractor.
But PT Abul Pratama director Faried Nahdi was quoted by Antara
as saying that he had not received any news either from the
Indonesian embassy in Riyadh, the Saudi government or the
Ministry of Manpower.
"I visited the ministry on Thursday, but there was no news
that any of the company's migrant workers would be beheaded,"
Faried said referring to the usual form of execution in Saudi
Arabia.
Faried added that he had gone through his files and could not
find Dimiyati's name.
Antara reported yesterday that the Indonesian Embassy had
provided a local lawyer, Al Hasim, to defend the unnamed
Indonesian.
Half of a dozen people from Women's Solidarity for Human
Rights staged a peaceful demonstration yesterday at the Ministry
of Manpower demanding an explanation of Dimiyati's case.
"We regret that the information on the matter is not
available," they said in a statement.
The government has been criticized for its poor handling of
the problems facing Indonesian migrant workers.
Last year, Indonesians were shocked when they heard that a
migrant worker, Solehah Anam Kadiran, had been beheaded in Mecca,
Saudi Arabia, in September.
She had been convicted of killing her employer.
People were even more outraged when they learned that Nasiroh
Karmudin, another female Indonesian worker in Saudi Arabia, was
also about to be executed for a similar crime.
Intensive diplomatic efforts worked in Nasiroh's favor as she
escaped the death penalty after one of the murdered man's wives
pardoned her.
Nasiroh still has to complete a five-year prison term which
ends in September.
Given the large number of problematic Indonesian workers in
Saudi Arabia, the government launched a massive airlift in
November to bring 24,000 workers home.
There are about 600,000 Indonesians working legally in Saudi
Arabia. Most of them are women.
Saudi Arabia and Malaysia are the foreign countries with the
highest number of Indonesian workers. (byg)