By Wassim Mroueh, Annie Slemrod
BEIRUT: The Ethiopian domestic
worker whose beating outside her country’s consulate was caught on tape and
widely publicized committed suicide Wednesday, Ethiopia’s consul general in
Lebanon confirmed to The Daily Star.
Alem Dechasa, 33, hanged herself
using her bed sheets between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m., Ethiopian Consul General Asaminew
Debelie Bonssa said doctors had told him. She was in Pyschiatrique de la
Croix Hospital, known as Deir al-Salib. Police took her there after the
beating some three weeks ago.
Justice Minister Shakib Qortbawi
vowed that investigations would continue. “For us, the matter is not over,”
he told The Daily Star. “We are considering what to do now. We have to see
if the [Ethiopian] consulate wants to file a lawsuit.”
He said Wednesday that an
Ethiopian consular official arrived at a Beirut police station to file a
lawsuit against Ali Mahfouz – the owner of Dechasa’s employment agency –
and the man who was beaten her on tape. When he arrived he was told that
Dechasa had passed away.
A video released by LBCI last
week showed Dechasa moaning as a man, later identified as Ali Mahfouz, beat
her and forced her into a car.
Another man helped Mahfouz, as
others stood by. According to Bonssa, the incident took place two weeks
before it became public.
Last week, Bonssa explained that
a man brought Dechasa into the consulate, saying she was sick. Bonssa said
he advised the man to take her to the hospital for treatment. “From outside
I heard voices,” he said, and he called the police.
Mahfouz told LBC that Dechasa
had attempted suicide three times.
A security source told The Daily
Star that Mahfouz was briefly arrested last week, but was released after
leaving his address with the magistrate.
The source added that
investigations are taking place under the supervision of Beirut Public
Prosecutor George Karam.
Betty Barakat, from the
nonprofit organization Caritas, who visited Dechasa Monday, said the
Ethiopian was married with two children. She hailed from Burayu, not far
from Addis Ababa, and had been in Lebanon for two months.
Bonssa said he was “deeply
shocked” by the news, adding that he had seen Dechasa Saturday and she
appeared fine. Bonssa also said doctors checked on her at 5 a.m. Wednesday
morning and when they returned at 6 a.m. she was dead.
He added that he had been told
Dechasa was on suicide watch. The hospital declined to comment, citing
privacy concerns.
According to Bonssa, Dechasa
arrived in Lebanon illegally, as Ethiopia banned domestic workers from
traveling to Lebanon some three years ago.
In a statement from his office,
Labor Minister Salim Jreissati said he had given “strict instructions” to
ask Dechasa’s employment agency about the circumstances of her employment,
“as well as the health problems she reportedly suffered from. What happened
is a human tragedy that opens the door for cleaning the employment agency
sector, and completely opening the agency issue.”
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