50 jailed Filipino minors in Saudi need help


A militant group bared 50 Filipino children are currently languishing in Saudi Arabian jails and need to be saved by the government, abs-cbnNEWS.com learned Saturday.

Migrante Youth in a statement said the figures were nolessthan confirmed by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), which said at least 50 of the 1,115 Filipino detainees in Saudi Arabia are minors.

A total of 13 Filipinos are up for beheading on Saudi death row, four of them were executed last March.

"These alarming figures warrants a full blown inquiry on how our embassies and consulates abroad do their jobs in assisting our nationals especially those that are jailed in the death row," Mac Ramirez, Migrante Youth deputy secretary-general, said.

Ramirez issued the call amid frantic efforts by the government to save Filipino Reynaldo "Fahad" Cortez from beheading in Saudi Arabia.

Cortez was sentenced to death by the Riyadh Grand Court for killing a Pakistani driver who made sexual advances on him.

Ramirez also scored Philippine Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Bahnarim Guinomla for his alleged incompetence in handling the cases of jailed Filipinos under his watch.

The militant group stressed President Arroyo should waste no time in exerting all efforts to save Cortez and the 50 minors.

Press Secretary Ignacio R. Bunye said the government is exhausting all legal options to save Cortez.


Bunye said the DFA is making the necessary representations with the Saudi government for the possible revision of the death sentence imposed on Cortez.

Bunye said Malacanan hopes that Filipino diplomats in Riyadh would succeed in saving Cortez from execution.

man i'd rather stay home and not get crap, than work for foreigners that most of the time don't respect you.

I can understand saving minors and other innocent people. But according to your post, Cortez killed someone just because he got hit on. If a foreigner came to the states and murdered someone here, I wouldn't want him free'd.

sexual advances could be alot of things.

Murder is still murder. We can't expect him to be pardoned for it, even if he had a good reason to be highly pissed. You can't go around to other countries, and get angry, kill people, and then ask your gov't to step in and save you. If he committed murder in his own country, he wouldn't be pardoned, why would we want him pardoned because he killed someone in another nation?