A four-member Sri Lankan legal delegation will leave for Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to finalise an appeal to the Saudi Supreme Court against the death sentence imposed on Sri Lankan migrant worker Anojan Sivarasa.
The team is led by Additional Solicitor General Azard Navavi, PC, and includes President’s Counsels Faizer Musthapha and Upul Kumarapperuma, and Attorney-at-Law Hafeel Farisz, the Daily Mirror reported.
This is the first time the lawyers actually conducting the appeal have been named. Earlier reporting on the case had described the government’s efforts only in general terms — diplomatic representations, a clemency appeal, and petitions from religious bodies.
What the delegation will do
Navavi told the Daily Mirror the delegation would finalise the documents for the appeal and meet Saudi officials to explore avenues for addressing the case. He told the Sunday Times that the team would meet representatives of two legal firms handling the case and finalise the documents for the Supreme Court process.
The meeting with the Saudi firms is set for Wednesday (7 October), with meetings and coordination scheduled from Wednesday to Thursday. The arrangements are being made with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, its relevant departments and officials of the Sri Lankan Embassy.
The Foreign Ministry has secured the services of the two Saudi law firms. The appeal seeking relief from the death sentence is expected to be filed through the Attorney General’s Department within what the Daily Mirror describes as the stipulated period.
Two tracks, running in parallel
The legal route is one of two the government is pursuing.
President Anura Kumara Dissanayake is expected to send a clemency appeal to the King of Saudi Arabia, and a separate parliamentary delegation is due to travel to Saudi Arabia carrying that appeal. Both outlets report the parliamentary mission as distinct from this legal one. The Sri Lankan Embassy in Riyadh continues to monitor the case through diplomatic channels.
How the sentence became a death sentence
Sivarasa, from Natpittimunai, Kalmunai, was initially sentenced by the Al-Ahsa Criminal Court to five years in prison and a fine of three million Saudi Riyals over a social media statement.
His legal team appealed seeking a reduction of that sentence. Saudi prosecutors appealed separately seeking a harsher one. The appellate court then increased the sentence to death — the Sunday Times describes the conviction as being for a blasphemy offence.
That sequence is the central fact of the case: the death sentence was not the original penalty but the outcome of an appeal that his own side had initiated.
Not reported
Neither outlet names the two Saudi law firms, gives a date for the Supreme Court hearing, states the deadline the appeal must be filed within, or says who is paying the firms’ fees. Neither reports Sivarasa’s current place of detention or whether his family has been able to see him.
The campaign so far
The delegation follows weeks of pressure from religious and political bodies. The Mahanayake Theros of the Ramanna and Amarapura Maha Nikayas petitioned the President on 30 September, alongside separate memoranda from Hindu clergy. Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim and Christian leaders met at Gangaramaya in late September to press the same case, former Maldivian president Mohamed Nasheed offered to assist, and the government confirmed in September that it was pursuing clemency through diplomatic channels.
