Mien denies mentioning prostitutes in Saudi Arabia

JAKARTA (JP): State Minister of Women's Roles Mien Sugandhi has denied ever alleging that hundreds of Indonesian women had been forced into prostitution in Saudi Arabia.

Instead, she accused the press of twisting her words in order to set her against Minister of Manpower Abdul Latief, Antara reported yesterday. "Some reporters contrived news so that it sounded as if I said something, when I had not," she said.

Speaking before a seminar on women workers, Mien said she would still go to check on the situation of Indonesian workers abroad, including those in Saudi Arabia.

Earlier last week, the news agency had quoted Mien as saying many Indonesian teenagers had been sent to work in Saudi Arabia as prostitutes.

"Their number is not in the tens, but has already reached the hundreds," Mien had reportedly said, adding that most of the women were less than 20 years of age, came from poor villages and were lured into working in red light districts in Jakarta before being sent to Saudi Arabia.

She reportedly said that most of the women reached Saudi Arabia by joining the hordes of other female workers dispatched by government-supervised manpower exporting agencies to work in the Middle-East kingdom.

Abdul Latief denied the reports, as did Saudi Arabian Ambassador Abdullah Abdulrahman Alim who also reiterated that his country observed strict rules of behavior.

Mien said yesterday that reporters had failed to quote her complete statements and had fragmented her words so that they became distorted.

"The way they quoted me was not right. They should have written: Ibu Gandhi will go to several countries to meet Dharma Wanita, Dharma Pertiwi, and Indonesian women, including workers," she said.

"Instead, they linked my statements with prostitutes," she complained. "But let it all go... I'd better be quiet... I'm not denying anything, what's important is that I'm still going there."

"Fortunately the minister of manpower has understood the problem. This must be some people's attempt to set us against each other," she said. (swe)