Dubai, September 03: Saudi officials have refuted claims that a sponsor in Riyadh hammered nails into the body of his Sri Lankan housemaid as punishment, saying the allegations are baseless.
”These allegations against the Saudi employer are baseless and the whole episode looks like one big drama,” said Saad Al-Baddah, chairman of the Saudi Arabian National Recruitment Committee (SANARCOM), which is responsible for the recruitment and management of foreign workers in the Kingdom.
He told Arab News that 49-year-old L T Ariyawathi has signed a letter acknowledging her last salary and said she did not experience any problems with her sponsor before she left Saudi Arabia.
Mr Al-Baddah described the torture allegations as a figment of the maid’s imagination, adding that Saudi authorities are wondering how the nails and needles were embedded into her body.
Earlier, a report from Colombo said Saudi officials had agreed to cooperate with Sri Lanka to investigate the atrocities committed on the Lankan maid by her Saudi sponsor.
The maid did not visit the doctors straight from the airport, but she went only after a few days, Mr Al-Baddah said.
He added that the Saudi sponsor, who is over 60, suffers from heart ailments.
”The sponsor’s doctors have advised him to do only 25 per cent of his normal work because of his weak heart,” he said.
”How can a person in such poor health be able to do a strenuous activity like hammering nails into a woman’s body?” he questioned adding that a woman with so many nails pierced in her body could not survive for weeks.
At the same time Mr Al-Baddah met chairman of the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLFBE) Kingsley Ranawake at his office on August 31 and pledged all cooperation in any investigation into the maid’s case.
The Saudi Embassy in Colombo also issued a statement on September 1 casting doubt on Ariyawathi’s claims.
”The important factor is that this housemaid cannot pass security checks and sophisticated machines at Riyadh and Colombo International Airports with these metal things inside her body,” an Embassy spokesman said.
–UNI