Yemen’s President Rashad al-Alimi has approved the death sentence of Indian nurse Nimisha Priya, who has been serving a prison sentence since 2017 for the murder of a Yemeni national. According to media reports, the death sentence will be executed within a month.
Responding to the development, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on Monday said, India is aware of the sentencing of Nimisha Priya in Yemen.
“We understand that Priya’s family is exploring relevant options. The government is providing all possible assistance in this matter,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a statement.
The Yemeni president’s decision was a blow to his country’s family, which had been trying to save the 36-year-old from the death penalty. His 57-year-old mother Prema Kumari arrived in Yemen’s capital Sanaa earlier this year and has been living there since then, reportedly to seek remission of the death sentence and negotiate blood money with the victim’s family.
nimisha priya case
Priya was found guilty of the murder of Yemeni national Talal Abdo Mahdi in 2017. A year later, he was sentenced to death by a trial court in Yemen. Since then his family has been fighting for his release. He approached the Yemini Supreme Court against the trial court order, but his appeal was rejected in 2023. Now, the country’s president has also rejected Priya’s appeal, with her release contingent on securing an apology from the victim’s family and their tribal leaders.
His mother, Prema Kumari, has been trying to negotiate blood money with the victim’s family, but talks with the victim’s family came to an abrupt halt in September after Abdullah Ameer, a lawyer appointed by the Indian Embassy, demanded a pre-negotiation fee. According to a report in Manorama Online, worth $20,000 (approximately Rs 16.6 lakh).
The Foreign Ministry had already provided $19,871 to the emir in July, but he insisted on a total fee of $40,000, payable in two installments, before resuming talks.
Save Nimisha Priya International Action Council was successful in raising the first installment of Amir’s fees through crowdfunding. However, he later reportedly faced challenges in ensuring transparency for donors on how the funds were being used.
About Nimisha Priya
Palakkad native Nimisha Priya is a trained nurse who worked in private hospitals in Yemen for a few years. Her husband and minor daughter returned to India in 2014 due to financial reasons. That same year, Yemen fell into civil war and they could not return, as the country stopped issuing new visas.
Later in 2015, Priya sought Mahdi’s support to set up her own clinic in Sanaa, because under Yemeni law, only citizens are allowed to set up clinics and business firms.
According to her appeal petition in the Yemeni Supreme Court, in 2015, Mahdi accompanied Priya to Kerala when she came for a month’s vacation. During the trip, he steals her wedding photograph, which he later manipulates to claim that he married her.
Upon their return, when Priya starts the clinic, Mahadi starts usurping all the revenue. They also manipulated the ownership documents of the clinic. When Nimisha Priya questions him about the embezzlement he becomes hostile towards her.
He started withdrawing money from Priya’s monthly earnings after telling everyone that she was his wife and even altered their photographs to show that they were married. Priya alleged in her petition that the harassment soon turned into physical torture and Mehdi even confiscated her passport.
According to her petition, Priya also approached the police in Sanaa regarding the matter, but instead of taking action against Mahdi, the police arrested him and put him in jail for six days.
In July 2017, Priya contacted the warden of a prison near her clinic, where Mahdi was previously jailed under various charges.
The warden suggested that he should try to render him unconscious and then convince him to give up his passport. However, the anesthetic had no effect on Mahdi, who was a drug user. She tried to sedate him again using a strong sedative to get his passport back, but he died within minutes of a drug overdose.
