International Healthcare News: Expat maid 'had nails hammered into body'
02/09/10 14:47
An expatriate worker from Sri Lanka has returned home from Saudi Arabia to seek expat medical advice after she claimed that her former employers hammered 24 nails into her body.
L G Ariyawathi, who worked as a maid in the Middle Eastern country, told a newspaper that the family she worked for had tortured her with the nails as punishment.
"They (employer and his family) did not allow me even to rest. The woman at the house had heated the nails and then the man inserted them into my body," the expatriate said, according to the Associated Press.
Nails measuring between one and two inches long have shown up on an X-ray scan inside Ms Ariyawathi's body and healthcare officials are now trying to extract them.
The incident has raised concerns over the welfare of expatriate workers abroad and could threaten to turn into a diplomatic dispute between the two countries.
However, Saudi officials have cast doubts over the claim, with Saad al-Badah, head of the National Recruitment Committee of the Council of the Saudi Chambers of Commerce and Industry, commenting that the account given by the expatriate seemed "80 per cent fabricated", APF news agency reported.
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