ASIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION - URGENT APPEALS PROGRAM Dear friends, This is a very fast up-date of the Urgent Appeal which was sent out about the impending death sentence on the Ethiopian domestic worker, Yeshiworq Desta, in Bahrain. Today AHRC received the Press Statement of the Ethiopian Women Lawyers' Association which we would like to share with you. If you can respond to their appeal for support, please communicate with them directly. The Statement is attached. THE ORIGINAL APPEAL AHRC UA Index: 001212 12 December 2000 -------------------------------------------------------------------- UA 42/00: Ethiopian girl on death row in Bahrain BAHRAIN - Stop the brutal execution of Ethiopian woman -------------------------------------------------------------------- "It's a total shock for us. For a young woman to reach such a position, there must be something wrong going on." "She was badly treated for about two years. She was not paid a single coin." We are saddened by the news that a 20 year-old Ethiopian woman, named Yeshiworq Desta Zewdu is scheduled to be executed without any proper investigation and fair trial in Bahrain. Yeshiworq Zewdu, was employed as a domestic worker is accused of killing her employer in early December 1998, when she was only 18 and then was sentenced to death by a Bahraini court on November 28, 2000. But from the reports we have received, she had been brutally beaten and psychologically abused by her employer and has never received a fair trial. We urge you to take prompt action on this matter, so as to stop the brutal execution and take proper legal representation and fair trial. BACKGROUND "Back-breaking jobs" Ethiopian women are enticed by promises of better life in Arab states. But in fact, thousands of Ethiopian immigrants are being treated in a similar manner like Yeshiworq's case in Bahrain and other Arab countries. Their employers confiscate their passports so that they can not escape and subject them to incredible abuse, including rape, frequent beatings and other physical and psychological torture. Ethiopia Women's Affairs Minister, Tadelech Haile Mikael told the BBC that "She was badly treated for about 2 years. She was not paid a single coin." The Ethiopian Minister said Yeshiworq had found it difficult to flee from her employer because she had lost her passport and government officials have confirmed that many of the girls are employed in back-breaking jobs for up to 18 hours and some are physically tortured and raped. SUGGESTED ACTION Please write two letters: the first you can send your protest letter to the Embassy of the state of Bahrain in each your country, and the second as a fax or forard this Urgent Appeal to the UN Special Rapporteurs on Human Rights of Migrants and Violence against Women. The addresses and contents of these letters should be as follows. Contents: -Calling on the Bahrain government to stop the execution of Yeshiworq Desta Zewdu. Also request that proper legal investigation and fair trial should be taken immediately. -Also urge the Bahrain authorities and governments of other countries to either stop the abuse of Ethiopian women who reside in their countries, or let them return to Ethiopia. 1. The Embassy of the State of Bahrain in USA 3502 International Drive NW Washington, DC 20008 TEL: +202 342 0741 FAX: +202 362-2192 2. Special Rapporteur on Human Rights of Migrants Att. Mr. Rafael Miranda, Assistant to the RC UNOG-OHCHR CH-1121 Geneva 10 SWIZERLAND FAX: +41 22 9179039 < 3. Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women Att. Ms Christina Saunders, Assistant to the RC UNOG-OHCHR CH-1121 Geneva 10 SWIZERLAND FAX: +41 22 9179003 < *** Please send a copy of your letter to AHRC Ugent Appeals *** Email: < Fax : +852 2698 6367 Please contact the AHRC Urgent Appeals Coordinator if you require further information or to make requests for further appeals ================================================================ AHRC Urgent Appeals Programme Asian Human Rights Commission Unit D, 7th Floor, Mongkok Commercial Centre, 16 - 16B Argyle Street, Kowloon, HONGKONG Tel: +(852) - 2698-6339 Fax: +(852) - 2698-6367 E-mail: ua@ahrchk.org ___________________________ PRESS RELEASE Ethiopian Women Lawyers Association December 12, 2000 The Mentally Sick Ethiopian Woman Must Be Saved From the Death Sentence The Bahrain newspaper Akbar AlKalij, in its issue of November 29, 2000 carried a headline reading: ìDEATH FOR MAID WHO BUTCHERED EMPLOYERî. The newspaper reported that a 20-year old young Ethiopian woman living as a migrant worker in Bahrain, who was found guilty of first degree murder by Bahrainís High Criminal Court for a murder she committed on December 1, 1998 had been sentenced to death. The deceased, Saadiyya Baltar, who was a Philippines national was a mother of two and married to a Bahraini. The newspaper reported, on the other hand, that the accused had tried to convince the court of the abuses her deceased employer had been perpetrating on her. Here in Ethiopia, the December 9, 2000 issue of íEletawi Addis (Addis Daily), citing the newspaper Kalhiji Times, reported that the death sentence was passed on the accused on November 28, 2000 and that it would be carried within 40 days after the handing down of the verdict. It also reported that the accused had the right to appeal the sentence. The Ethiopian Women Lawyers Association, while granting the gruesome nature of the crime, nevertheless considers it only as one of the manifestations of the continuous suffering in the hands of employers that Ethiopian women refugees in Bahrain have been made to bear, not just as an isolated case involving one young woman alone. The disappointments and anger expressed by the people here and transmitted over the mass media over the last couple of days had as their core message exactly the same point we at the Association are raising in this Press Release. It is well known that Ethiopian women, in an attempt to run away from the unbearable burdens of poverty in their country and hoping, in the process, to make a better living, have been flooding to Middle Eastern countries over the past few years. Once they got to what they considered would be a land of promises, however, they realized that not only did they not find things upto their expectations but, on the contrary, what they met with, to their utter dismay, was misery and suffering such as they had never thought would happen. What they found themselves in was a snare from which they couldnít extricate themselves such that they could only nurse their homesickness with no hope of ever coming back to their loved ones here. Quite a few have returned home either as mental patients or physically deformed and disabled. The number of those who left in a plane or by other means only to come back home in a sealed coffin is not small either. The physical and mental torture they suffer are of a wide range: exposure to hunger; subjection to beatings; being denied earned wages; being forced to toil without sleep; being raped by employers; having parts of their body seared in boiling oil by wives of their employers; being grilled with hot iron; being thrown out of high-rise windows; being harassed by illegal brokers and the police; having their passports forcefully taken away; being robbed of their bodily organs while still alive; languishing in prisons for years on the pretext that they didnít have legal residence permits; and, as a result, being driven to despair and mental sickness and finally taking away their own lives. It is not our belief that the abuses thus suffered by Ethiopian women in Bahrain are unknown either to the society at large or the countryís Head of State or the Prime Minister. Among the actions taken by governments in the region the the process of establishing in Beirut, Lebanon, of a minor bureau whose task is the follow-up of the affairs of Ethiopian refugees living in the region. As of March 5, 1998 a Proclamation establishing the Agency to liaison between private enterprises and employees has been issued. The aim of the proclamation is to give legal recognition to the hiring of refugees and to ensure that, in the event of conflicts arising between employers and employees, there would be individuals to be held legally accountable. A committee composed of representatives from government instiutions has been established to investigate into the nature of the problem. Except for these minor efforts, however, neither a sound policy has been formulated nor any serious action taken by the governments commensurate with the violation of the rights of women refugees or to stop the abuses perpetrated against them. A. Legal Defense Opportunities Not Available to the Accused Although the details of the legal proceedings against the young lady whose case forms the basis of this press release are not yet fully known, on the basis of the few evidences available to us, we have been able to make the following observations: Although it is true that the accused has been found guilty of aggravated crime, she has been denied professional legal counsel in accordance with what the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights and The International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families. When one considers the gruesome nature of the crime the accused committed, it easily transpires that the accused is mentally disturbed. Evidences have been found that at present the accused is officially categorized as a mental case. This being the case, no official testimony by psychiatric professionals has been provided to the court that would exonerate the accused from guilt and to prevent the court from handing down the death sentence. While the accused currently is 20 years of age, she could possibly have been less than 18 (and, therefore, a minor) at the time she committed the crime. Therefore, a criminal procedure set up for adults should not be applicable in her case. The Convention on the Rights of the Child prohibits both life imprisonment and the death sentence. B. The Question of Repatriating the Accused to Her Country According to international law, in cases involving criminal acts, the country in whose territory the crime has been committed can make decisions on the basis of its national penal code. In this regard, although the deceased is a Philippines national and the accused an Ethiopian, since the crime was committed within the legal territory of Bahrain, the Bahrain law has full force. This is known in international law as ëterritoril jurisdictioní. Although Ethiopia may claim ëpersonal jurisdictioní, as the accused is an Ethiopian national, unless Bahrain is willing to hand over the accused to Ethiopia, Bahrain law takes precedence over that of Ethiopia. However, if the diplomatic efforts being now made through the Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs prove successful, then there is a possibility for the accused to be repatriated to her country. C. The Associationís Call If the death sentence handed down by the court of Bahrain is carried out in a situation where the gruesome murder committed by the accused was caused by the mental disturbance the accused sufferes, it will entail in an irremediable violation of international law. Because the right of the accused to be represented by a professional legal counsel has not been respected and, also, because it has not been established that the accused had actually reached the age to take legal responsibility for her action at the time she committed the crime, the following concurrent steps should be taken immediately to stop the carrying out of the sentence: The Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs should pursue the diplomatic efforts it has already started either bilaterally with the Government of Bahrain and/or through the mediation of the United Nations Human Rights Commission; it should also rally international support to persuade the governments of both Bahrain and the Philippines; Both the Ethiopian Government and non-governmental organizations should join hands in the effort to appeal the case of the accused by acquiring paid or volunteer legal counsels who would be in a position to stand in front of a Bahrain court and argue the case of the accused, with the view to have the courtís ruling overturned; Establish a national committee with Ethiopian Women Lawyersí Association acting as a co-ordinating body. The task of the committee thus established shall be to rally individuals as well as groups around the cause of the accused and ensure that their efforts will get the appropriate response; the committee will further serve as a pressure group to make sure that future abuses on other women in the region are stopped. Conduct continuous and regular media campaigns to attract international recognition of and sympathy for the unfortunate predicament and sad fate of the accused. ( 1 3 7 6 0 ( 53 17 01 or 53 18 67 Fax 53 18 18 e-mail: HYPERLINK mailto:ewla@telecom.net.et ewla@telecom.net.et _______________________________________________ Stop-traffic mailing list Stop-traffic@friends-partners.org http://fpmail.friends-partners.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/stop-traffic