Saudi sentences Indonesian maid to death for murder

A Saudi court sentenced an Indonesian housemaid to death after she was convicted of murdering her employers\' four-year-old child, the Saudi Gazette reported on Monday. The maid was \"charged with decapitating the girl with a cleaver when her parents were away at work and her sisters were at school,\" the newspaper reported, adding that the woman\'s lawyer will file an appeal. The court on Sunday sentenced to death an \"Indonesian housemaid who was found guilty of murdering Tala Al-Shehri, a four-year-old girl, in (the Red Sea city of) Yanbu last September,\" the English-language Saudi Gazette reported. The woman was also handed down an eight-month jail term and 200 lashes for attempted suicide after committing the horrific crime, it said. The victim\'s parents have refused to forgive the maid in return for blood money, the daily said. The maid\'s lawyer, appointed by the Indonesian mission in Riyadh, said that the consulate will initiate legal action in Jakarta against a man who the newspaper said had convinced, via text messages, the woman to commit the crime. In April last year, local media reported that 25 Indonesian maids are on death row in Saudi Arabia and 22 others have been pardoned and sent home. In June, 2011, Indonesian maid Ruyati binti Sapubi, 54, was beheaded after she was convicted of killing her Saudi employer, prompting Indonesia to recall its ambassador in Saudi Arabia for \"consultations.\" Indonesian anger over the treatment of its manual labourers in the oil-rich Gulf monarchy has grown after a spate of cases of abuse and killings. Indonesia had also announced a moratorium on sending migrant workers to Saudi Arabia, where hundreds of thousands of Indonesians toil as maids and labourers. Rights groups say millions of mostly Asian domestic workers are regularly exposed to physical and financial abuse in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states because of poor or non-existent labour laws.