Family of Indian nurse on death row in Yemen says no official word on execution date

Kochi | The family of Nimisha Priya, an Indian nurse facing the death penalty in Yemen for the alleged murder of a Yemeni national, said on Friday they have not received any official information about reports that she will be executed on July 16.

"We have not received any official communication so far. We only came to know about it through news reports," her husband, Tomy Thomas, told PTI.

He spoke amid news reports quoting a social worker involved in talks with Yemeni officials and the victim Talal Abdo Mahdi's family, who said the public prosecutor had sent an order to the prison and the execution is set for July 16.

The woman has been imprisoned in a Yemeni jail since 2017 for the crime.

Reports said Priya was handed capital punishment by a trial court in 2020 and Yemen's Supreme Judicial Council upheld the verdict in November 2023 but left room for a possible reprieve through blood money (diya)--a settlement with the victim's family.

This slim chance of clemency has been the focus of the Nimisha Priya Action Council's efforts to save the nurse's life.

A daily wage labourer and driver, Priya's husband Thomas has been forced to send their daughter, now a seventh class student, to a hostel due to financial constraints.

The family is burdened by a debt of Rs 60 lakh, incurred in 2015 to set up a clinic in Yemen, which was shut down in 2017, Thomas had said earlier.