Rizana: Lakmawa Diyaniyo petition to Saudi Embassy today

Mohammed Naalir

COLOMBO: The signatures collected by Lakmawa Diyaniyo (Daughters of Mother Lanka) to safeguard Lankan housemaid Rizana Nafeek, in death row for allegedly killing the four month infant of her employer in Saudi Arabia, will be handed over to the Saudi Arabian Embassy this afternoon.

The Lakmawa Diyaniyo have also arranged a march to draw the attention of the relevant authorities. The march is to commence from the precincts of the Devatagaha Mosque to Saudi Arabia High Commission.

An appeal has been made to the authorities by Sri Lankan Embassy through a lawyer on July 14.

Rizana whose death sentence is currently reviewed in an appeal court in the Kingdom, looks confident said a senior Sri Lankan Embassy official who visited the maid in Dawadmi jail on Saturday.

Rizana had told the official that she is being well-looked after by the prison officials.

She had learnt her Sinhalese through a jail colleague who had taught her the island’s official language during her two year stay in jail.

Rizana’s parents visited their daughter in jail last month. She arrived in Saudi Arabia on May 4, 2005 as a housemaid in the household of Naif Jiziyan Khalif Al Otaibi.

A few days later she was transferred to the family household in Dawadami about 390 km from Riyadh. she was serving there for some time.

On May 22, 2005 while the inexperienced girl was bottle feeding the four month old infant it chocked to death.

The employer argued that the girl deliberately killed the infant. All evidence collected after the incident was against the girl and she is in death row. Rizana later said a confession was extracted under duress.