Rights group appeals over Sri Lankan maid in Saudi

RIYADH, July 9 (Reuters) An Asian rights group called today for clemency for a Sri Lankan maid who faces execution over the death of a baby in her charge in Saudi Arabia.

Rizana Nafeek was found guilty last month of strangling the four-month-old Saudi boy in 2005. The 17-year-old maid told the court the child choked to death while she was bottle-feeding him.

''After careful consideration of all facts we are of the view that what has happened is an enormous tragedy but it can lead to, if not prevented soon, a further tragedy of an innocent, inexperienced teenager being executed,'' the Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission said in a statement.

''The Asian Human Rights Commission is writing this appeal to all the Muslim scholars in the world regarding the case...'' It appealed to the child's family to pardon the Sri Lankan maid.

Sri Lanka's embassy in Riyadh said this week that it intended to appeal by a July 16 deadline, but that Saudi authorities had not yet provided the court documents necessary to proceed with the appeal process.

It said in a statement the case was complicated because Nafeek had originally given a confession to killing the child but later retracted it, saying she had faced police duress.

It added that the recruitment agency which sent Nafeek to the Saudi family had falsified documents to say she was 23.

There are over a million domestic maids working in Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter where many families employ foreign home help.

Rights organisations say many domestic maids work in difficult circumstances, do not know Arabic and often suffer from abuse by their employers.

Saudi Arabia puts murderers, rapists and drug traffickers to death, usually by public beheading.

REUTERS SV PM2128