"President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono must conduct high-level diplomacy with the Saudi King to save Tuti Tursilawati from execution," Executive Director of Migrant Care Anis Hidayah said here on Friday.
The government should be able to tell Saudi Arabia to stop executing Indonesian nationals, he said.
He added that the United Nations had asked the Saudi government to impose a moratorium and abolish the death penalty after beheading eight Bangladeshi migrant workers.
"If the government is serious in its diplomacy, I think it will receive international supports," Anis said.
Anis said Tuti is not alone in facing execution, because there are seven other migrant workers are threatened with death penalty. There are even around 43 migrant workers waiting for executions.
"The issue of migrant workers must not be considered trivial. The government must pay attention to the fate of the migrant workers on death row," Anis said.
Anis considered the performance of the Task Force on Protection of Migrant Workers set up by the government to obtain legal relief for the workers facing execution, was not optimal.
Anis said what had happened to Tuti was similar to the story of Darsem, a female migrant worker who had been saved her live after the government had paid some money to the heirs of the victim,
"She is a victim of the employer`s brutality, and had been frequently experienced sexual violence. Her fight to defend herself ended with the murder of her employer on May 11, 2011," he said.
The NGOs joining the Alliance included Kontras, Migrant Care, Imparsial, ELSAM, ANBTI, ICW, KWI, Demos, and Wahid Institute.
Tuti Tursilawati (27 years old) is originally from Cikeusik village, West Java. She left for Saudi Arabia on Sept 5, 2009 and was placed as a caregiver for her employer`s father.
She was arrested and sentenced to death in 2010 for murdering her employer`s father.
There was no information about her motive, but according to the vice chairman of the Indonesian Migrant Workers Union (SBMI), Ramses D Arman recently, Tuti was raped by her employer`s father before she killed him.
Until now, officials from the Indonesian consulate general in Jidda were still trying to save Tuti from execution by lobbying the victim`s family to forgive her. (*)
Editor: Kunto Wibisono
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
