wr2014_web_0

WORLD REPORT 2014every two years. The law would prohibit sponsors from employing workers outsidethe sponsor’s home or assigning work harmful to a worker’s health.Domestic workers, most of them women, frequently endure a range of abusesincluding overwork, forced confinement, non-payment of wages, food deprivation,and psychological, physical, and sexual abuse. Workers who attempted toreport employer abuses sometimes faced prosecution based on counterclaimsof theft or “sorcery.”Authorities executed 24-year-old Sri Lankan domestic worker Rizanna Nafeek inJanuary for the 2005 death of a 4-month-old child in her care, though Nafeekwas only 17 at the time of her alleged crime and despite her claims that investigatorsobtained her confession under duress and she did not have access to acompetent translator during interrogation.Key International ActorsThe United States, a key ally, did not publicly criticize Saudi human rights violationsbeyond Congressionally mandated annual reports, though StateDepartment spokespeople expressed “concerns” over the convictions of al-Hamid, al-Qahtani, and Badawi.In August, the US Department of Defense approved the sale of 1,300 clusterbombs to Saudi Arabia for more than US$640 million. Neither country is partyto the Convention on Cluster Munitions.In March 2013, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay “stronglycondemned” the executions of the seven Saudi men from Abha, including twowho were children at the time of the crimes for which they were convicted.604