Sri Lanka joined the world in celebrating May Day or International Workers Day yesterday amidst a shocking revelation that a Lankan expatriate worker is killed or dies every day in West Asia and elsewhere.
Nearly 60 percent of the victims are women and family members complain that the authorities were slow in making arrangements to bring the bodies back home or probe the deaths, though revenue from expatriate workers is one of the main sources of Sri Lanka's foreign exchange.
External Affairs Ministry's Consular Division official Somadasa Wijeysundera said the ministry handled some 40 deaths of Sri Lankan expatriates each month and nearly half this number had died under questionable circumstances.
For the first four months of this year alone the Foreign Ministry had handled some 150 such deaths, he said.Nearly 90 percent of the cases involved Lankans employed in West Asia and 60 percent of the victims were women, he said.
Mr. Wijeysundera said that in the most recent cases, a 26-year-old Sri Lankan man was stabbed and beaten to death in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, while a female teenage domestic was allegedly pushed to her death from a three-story building by her employer in the same city.
The victims were identified as Joyeth Sathiswaram from Kalmunai and 18-year-old Rizana M. Laila from Trincomalee.
The official said the two incidents occurred in the past two weeks and embassy officials were making the arrangements to bring the bodies to Colombo. He rejected allegations that the ministry was slow in bringing bodies back.
"This is a long process since we are dealing with foreign laws and customs which are often interrupted by local holidays and related events. Family members understandably are not aware of this. Hence the complaints," Mr. Wijeysundera said.
He said the highest number of deaths that included homicide cases was reported from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Jordan while there were a significant number of killings in Western countries also.
At least three Sri Lankans were killed in Italy some two weeks ago in a 'home and home drunken brawl', he said.
Sri Lanka Foreign Employment Bureau (SLFEB) Chairman Kingsley Ranawaka conceded that several deaths had occurred under questionable circumstances and the real reason or motive had remained unknown.
Meanwhile Robert Sathiswaram, father of the Sri Lankan worker who died in Riyadh, charged the authorities were 'horribly' slow in making the arrangements to bring his son's body home for a decent burial.
"We are Catholics and the final arrangements must be done accordingly," Mr. Sathiswaram said.
Similar feelings were expressed by Mohamed Habibulla, father of the teenage maid who also died two weeks ago in Riyadh. |
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