Indonesia protests against the execution of a Saudi domestic worker

JAKARTA: Jakarta officially protested against Saudi Arabia after the oil-rich kingdom executed an Indonesian domestic worker without notifying her family or consular staff.

Tuti Tursilawati was executed Monday in the city of Thaif, said the Indonesian Foreign Ministry, seven years after his death sentence for the murder of his employer, in an act that she considered a self-defense against sexual abuse.

President Joko Widodo Wednesday criticized the decision, saying the government had formally protested to Riyadh and called for better protection of Indonesian workers in the country.

Lalu Muhammad Iqbal, director of the Department for the Protection of Indonesian Citizens at the Foreign Ministry, told reporters on Tuesday that the initiative was "regrettable".

"The execution of Tuti Tursilawati was made without notification to our representatives, nor to Riyadh nor to Jeddah," he said at a press conference.

Tursilawati claimed that she was acting in self-defense when she killed her employer in 2010 after he tried to rape her.

Migrant Care, an NGO defending the rights of Indonesian workers abroad, condemned the execution and urged the government to take serious diplomatic action.

Indonesia is set to overturn its recent decision to allow a limited number of Indonesian migrant workers to Saudi Arabia, despite a 2015 moratorium banning new domestic workers from entering 21 countries in the country. Middle East.

Indonesia introduced the ban following the execution of two other Indonesian girls by Saudi Arabia the same year.

Drug trafficking, rape, murder, apostasy and armed robbery are all punishable by death under the strict Islamic Sharia law in Saudi Arabia.

In addition to the Middle East, Indonesia also sends domestic workers to many parts of Asia, including Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia, and has often complained about the treatment of its workers abroad.

A Hong Kong woman was jailed for six years for beating and starving her Indonesian maid and keeping her prisoner in a high-profile case that drew attention to abuses against aid workers. in the financial center.