BBCFamily members of an Indian nurse on death row in war-torn Yemen said they are pinning their hopes on a final attempt to save her.
It was Nimisha Priya, 34 years old He was sentenced to death She was accused of murdering a local man – her former business partner Talal Abdo Mahdi – whose dismembered body was discovered in a water tank in 2017.
She is being held in the central prison in the capital, Sanaa, and is scheduled to be executed soon, as Mahdi Al-Mashat, head of the Houthi Supreme Political Council, approved her sentence this week.
Under the Islamic judicial system, known as Sharia, the only way to stop the execution now is to obtain a pardon from the victim's family. For months, Nimisha's relatives and supporters have been trying to do this by collecting blood money, or blood money, to be paid to Mehdi's family, and negotiations are still ongoing.
But with time running out, supporters say their hopes rest entirely on the family's decision.
With the presidential sentence, the prosecutor's office will again seek the approval of Mahdi's family and ask if they have any objections to the execution, said Samuel Jerome, a Yemen-based social worker who holds power of attorney on behalf of Nimisha's family. the mom.
He added: “If they say they do not want to pardon her or cannot pardon her, the sentence will be suspended immediately.”
“Forgiveness is the first step. The family’s acceptance of blood money only comes after that.”
Under Yemeni laws, Nimisha's family cannot directly contact the victim's family and must hire negotiators.
Subhash Chandran, a lawyer who has represented Nimisha's family in India in the past, told the BBC that the family had already crowdfunded $40,000 (£32,268) for the victim's family. The money was handed over in two tranches to lawyers appointed by the Indian government to negotiate the case (Jerome says the delay in sending the second tranche affected the negotiations).
“We now need to explore the scope of discussions with (the victim's) family, which is only possible with the support of the Indian government,” Chandran said.
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs said it was aware of Nimisha's situation and was providing all possible assistance to the family.
Her family is worried but also hopeful.
Her husband, Tony Thomas, who spoke to her hours before the death sentence was approved, said: “Nimisha has no knowledge of what is happening outside the prison doors.” “The only thing you want to know is if our daughter is okay.”
Nimisha's mother is currently in Sanaa, having traveled there last year after a court in India Allowed It has to go to the area controlled by the Houthi rebels. She has met her daughter twice in prison since then.
The first meeting was very emotional. Her mother, Prema Kumari, told the BBC: “Nimisha saw me… and said that I had become weak and asked me to be brave and that God would save her. She asked me not to be sad.”
The second time, Ms. Kumari was accompanied by two nuns who prayed for her daughter in prison.
Nimisha was barely 19 when she went to Yemen.
She is the daughter of an underpaid domestic worker. She wanted to change her family's financial situation, and worked as a nurse in a government-run hospital in Sana'a for several years.
In 2011, she returned to her homeland – the city of Kochi in southern India – and married Mr. Thomas, a tuk-tuk driver.
The couple moved to Yemen together shortly afterward. But financial difficulties forced Mr Thomas to return to India with their infant daughter.
Tired of low-paying jobs in hospitals, Nimisha decided to open her own clinic in Yemen.
Since the law there requires that she have a local partner, she opened the clinic jointly with Mahdi, a shop owner.
The two were on good terms initially – when Nimisha briefly visited India for her daughter's baptism, Mehdi accompanied her.
Thomas told the BBC: “He seemed like a nice guy when he came to our house.”
But Mahdi's position, Thomas claimed, “suddenly changed” when civil war broke out in Yemen in 2014.
At the time, Nimisha was trying to finish the paperwork so that her husband and daughter could join her again.
But after the war broke out, the Indian government banned travel to Yemen, making it impossible for them to go with it.
During the following days, thousands of Indians were evacuated from the country, but Nimisha chose to stay because she had obtained huge loans to open her clinic.
Getty ImagesIt was then that Nimisha began complaining about Mehdi's behaviour, including allegations of physical torture, Thomas said.
A petition in court, filed by a group called International Action Council to Save Nimisha Priya, alleged that Mehdi snatched all her money, confiscated her passport and even threatened her with a gun.
After Mehdi's body was discovered in 2017, police accused Nimisha of killing him by giving him an “overdose of tranquilizers” and allegedly dismembering his body.
Nimisha denied the allegations. In court, her lawyer said that she tried to drug Mahdi just to get her passport back from him, but the dose was accidentally increased.
In 2020, a local court sentenced Nimisha to death. Three years later, in 2023, her family appealed the decision before the Supreme Court of Yemen, but their appeal was rejected.
Even with many twists and turns, the family is not willing to give up hope.
“My heart says we can reach a settlement and save Nimisha’s life,” Thomas said.
He said he was worried more than anything else about their daughter, now 13, who had “never experienced a mother's love.”
“They talk on the phone every week, and my daughter gets upset if she misses a call,” Thomas said.
“She needs her mother. What would she do without her?”
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