[Tlc] L-human rights/prisoner

[justinm at ucr.edu]

FYI.
Thanks,
justin



2009-0505 - AFP - Laos: UK Lawyer 'in the dark' over pregnant woman

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j8JsYd_9syJGSCWJIeSNA1VHCkMQ

Laos: UK Lawyer 'in the dark' over pregnant woman

4 hours ago

HANOI (AFP) — A British lawyer said Tuesday she was "left in the dark" over the case of a fellow Briton who is pregnant and facing a possible death sentence in Laos over a drugs charge.

Samantha Orobator, 20, was detained in August after allegedly being caught with 680 grams (1.5 pounds) of heroin while trying to board a plane to Thailand.

Under Laotian law, she could face the firing squad if convicted, although the global human rights watchdog Amnesty International has said the country has an effective moratorium on capital punishment.

Anna Morris of the British charity Reprieve, which assists people facing the death penalty, told AFP from Laos that a meeting expected later Tuesday with Orobator still had not been confirmed, and neither had her trial date.

"We are very much in the hands of the Lao authorities, and very much in the dark," Morris said, adding that her organisation had been told it could meet with Orobator on Tuesday.

"They should be making it a priority to allow us to see her," she said.

Reprieve says it wants a Laotian lawyer appointed to represent Orobator.

Britain's vice consul at the embassy in Bangkok has travelled to Laos and was "intending to visit her in prison imminently", a Foreign Office spokeswoman in London said late Monday.

A spokesman for the Lao government, Khenthong Nuanthasing, said Monday that Orobator's trial will take place sometime this week. He could not immediately be reached for comment on Tuesday.

A British embassy spokesman in Bangkok said he had not received official confirmation of the trial date.

British diplomats first visited Orobator on August 14, within a week of being notified of her arrest, and have returned several times since, the spokesman said.

Everyone found in Laos with more than 500 grams of heroin faces the death penalty.

In a statement last July, Amnesty International said there had been no executions in Laos since 1989.

The Lao government spokesman has said that as far as he knows, no foreigner had ever been executed in Laos.

Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved.
©2009 Google
__._,_.___

______________
Dr. Justin McDaniel
Dept. of Religious Studies
3046 INTN
University of California, Riverside
Riverside, CA 92521
951-827-4530
justinm at ucr.edu