Maid abuser denies torture charges

A woman who was reported early this month to have severely tortured her Indonesian housemaid denied the charges and claimed the maid did that to herself, the Saudi Okaz Arabic language daily reported on Tuesday.

Abdul Rahman Al Mahmadi, a lawyer for the tortured maid, said he had been told by his client that the 53-year-old widow used a hot iron, a metal object and a broom stick in torturing her at their house in the central town of Madina.

“Investigation results show that the woman had not used a knife but a hot iron, a metal object and a broom stick to inflict body injuries on the maid,” he said.

“The maid is now recovering following her head surgery…during the interrogation, the woman insisted that she did not harm the maid and accused her of hurting herself without interference from any one else.”

Okaz said Sumiati Salan Mustapa, 23, has just been moved out of the intensive care unit at King Fahd Hospital in Madina while the unidentified widow has remained in custody pending trial.

Mustapa’s torture has triggered fresh furore inside and outside the Kingdom over the widespread abuse of housemaids by their employers in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf oil producers, which are heavily reliant on foreign labour.

Indonesia, which has over 500,000 maids in Saudi Arabia, has sent two ministers to Riyadh to follow up Mustapa’s case but has denied reports that it would stop the travel of its maids to the Kingdom.

Last week, the maid was reported as saying that her employer, a mother of seven, told her she wanted to cure her from a mental illness. Newspapers also said the woman herself had undergone psychiatric tests in detention.