World

Indian domestic worker executed in UAE for killing baby

Published

1 month ago

March 5, 2025

editor

An Indian woman who worked as a domestic helper in the United Arab Emirates has been executed after she was convicted of killing her employers’ baby.

Shahzadi Khan, who worked for an Indian couple, was executed last month, according to the Indian government.

According to Abu Dhabi court documents, Khan asphyxiated the boy, but a doctor who testified at the trial could not confirm this as he had not been allowed to perform a post-mortem.

Khan’s family maintain she was innocent and say the four-month-old died from an incorrect vaccination on the day of his death. They said Khan did not get “adequate representation” during her trial. The BBC contacted UAE authorities for comment.

The execution was carried out on 15 February, but the news was only confirmed by Indian authorities on 3 March after Khan’s parents petitioned the Delhi High Court seeking information about their daughter.

The secrecy surrounding the execution has made headlines in India, which has close ties with United Arab Emirates. Hundreds of thousands of Indians live and work in the country.

According to the petition filed by Khan’s family, she had moved to Abu Dhabi in December 2021 to work for the Indian family as a caregiver.

She was entrusted to look after the baby, who was born in August the following year. According to Khan’s father, she would often call her family back in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh and show them the baby over video calls.

But the calls stopped after his death – and the family later learnt that Khan was in jail. According to Khan’s family, the baby died on 7 December 2022, just hours after he received a vaccine.

Police arrested Khan two months later. She insisted that a video recording showing her confessing to killing the baby had been forced, and that she had not received proper legal support in court.

She was sentenced to death in July 2023. Her appeal was rejected in February 2024.

Khan’s family said they last heard from her on 13 February this year when she called from prison, saying that she might be executed the next day.

“She kept crying and said she was put in a separate cell, and that she would not come out alive and that it might be her last call,” her father Shabbir Khan told the BBC.

When Khan’s family did not hear from her after that, they filed a petition with the Delhi High Court, seeking information from the Indian government on whether she had been executed.

Khan’s family said they felt she did not have “adequate representation” which resulted in her receiving the death sentence.

In an interview with the Press Trust of India, her father Shabbir Khan said: “She didn’t get justice. I have tried everywhere, running around since last year. But I didn’t have money to go there [Abu Dhabi] to hire a lawyer.”

In an earlier statement released to BBC Hindi following her conviction, Khan’s employer said: “Shahzadi brutally and intentionally killed my son which is already proven by the United Arab Emirates authorities in the light of all the evidence.

“Misleading information has been provided to media and other authorities to gain [their] sympathy and shift the focus from the actual crime which she committed.”

In February, the Indian government informed parliament that a total of 54 Indians were on death row in foreign countries, including 29 in the UAE.

(BBC News)

World

China responds to claims of 245% tariffs on imports to US

Published

13 hours ago

April 16, 2025

editor

In response to an inquiry about the White House’s statement claiming China now faces up to a 245 percent tariff on imports to the US as a result of its retaliatory actions, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian responded on Wednesday that “you can ask the US side for the specific tax rate figures.”

Lin said on Wednesday’s press briefing that China has repeatedly stated its solemn position on the tariff issue. The tariff war was initiated by the US. China has taken necessary countermeasures to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests and international fairness and justice, which is completely reasonable and legal. Tariff and trade wars have no winner. China does not want to fight these wars but is not scared of them.

(Global Times)

World

Maldives bans Israeli passport holders

Published

23 hours ago

April 16, 2025

editor

The Maldives has officially barred Israeli passport holders from entering the country, citing solidarity with Palestinians amid the Jewish state’s war against Hamas in Gaza initiated by the terrorist group’s murder-and-kidnapping spree in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

Maldives President Dr Mohamed Muizzu has ratified the Third Amendment to the Maldives Immigration Act (Law No. 01/2007), following its passage by the People’s Majlis at the 20th sitting of the first session of the year, held on 15 April 2025.

The Amendment introduces a new provision to the Immigration Act, expressly prohibiting the entry of individuals holding Israeli passports into the territory of the Republic of Maldives, said the President’s office.

According to the President’s Office, the decision reflects the Indian Ocean nation’s condemnation of what it describes as Israel’s “ongoing atrocities” against the Palestinian people.

(Agencies)

World

Peru’s ex-president & first lady jailed for 15 years

Published

23 hours ago

April 16, 2025

editor

Peru’s former president, Ollanta Humala, has been found guilty of money laundering and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

A court in the capital, Lima, said that Humala had accepted illegal funds from the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht to bankroll his election campaigns in 2006 and 2011.

His wife, Nadine Heredia, who co-founded the Nationalist Party with Humala, was also found guilty of money laundering and sentenced to 15 years.

Heredia was granted asylum by Brazil and will have safe passage to travel there with her son, Peru’s foreign ministry said.

Prosecutors had asked that Humala be sentenced to 20 years in jail and Heredia to 26 and a half years.

After a trial lasting more than three years, the court gave its long-awaited verdict on Tuesday.

Humala attended the verdict in person while his wife heard it via video link.

The 62-year-old former president and his wife had denied any wrongdoing.

Who is Ollanta Humala?

Humala, a former army officer who fought against the Maoist Shining Path rebels, first came to national prominence in 2000 when he led a short-lived military rebellion against then-President Alberto Fujimori.

In 2006, he ran for president. He allied himself with the Venezuelan president at the time, Hugo Chávez, and prosecutors alleged that Humala had accepted illegal funding from Chávez to finance his campaign.

His rival for the presidency, Alan García, used Humala’s close ties to Chávez as a way to attack him, warning voters “not to let Peru turn into another Venezuela”.

In 2011, Humala ran for the presidency again, this time on a more moderate platform.

He said that rather than emulating Chávez’s socialist revolution in Venezuela, he would model his policies on those of the Brazilian president at the time, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

His approach proved successful and he defeated his right-wing rival, Keiko Fujimori.

But violent social conflicts early on his presidency quickly dented his popularity.

He also lost the support of many members of Congress, further weakening his position.

His legal troubles started shortly after his term had finished in 2016.

That year, the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht confessed to paying hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes to government officials and political parties across Latin America, to win business orders.

Prosecutors accused Humala and his wife of receiving millions of dollars from Odebrecht.

A year later, a judge ordered that the couple be placed in pre-trial detention.

They were released after a year but the investigation into their links with Odebrecht continued, culminating in today’s verdict.

(BBC News)