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REPORT o Saudi Arabia: A secret state of suffering
ISSUES o torture o military, security and police relations
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The death penalty Two people will probably be executed in Saudi Arabia the week you read this document, if the rate of recorded executions in 1999 continues. Most of those who are executed are beheaded in public. Saudi Arabia has one of the highest rates of executions in the world in both absolute numbers and per capita. The death penalty applies to a wide range of non-violent activities such as apostasy and "witchcraft", "sexual offences", acts deemed to amount to "corruption on earth", and crimes such as drug dealing.
Often, the first warning prisoners have of their imminent execution is when they are taken out of their cell in handcuffs on a Friday, the day executions are normally carried out. They are taken to a public square, blindfolded and forced to kneel. The executioner raises a sword, then brings the blade down across the prisoner's neck. Sometimes more than one stroke is needed to sever the head. A doctor certifies that the prisoner is dead, then the body and head are removed and buried. Amnesty International does not know whether condemned prisoners are given tranquillizers. It does not know whether they are allowed to see a representative of their religious faith, or whether an appropriate religious ceremony is conducted before, during or after death. What it does know is that foreign nationals are rarely if ever allowed to see their loved ones before they are executed and are never given advance warning of their execution. For those awaiting execution, the psychological torment is extreme. Sa'ad al-Din 'Izz al-Din Muhammad, a Sudanese national, was executed in 1996 for a murder he denied having committed. A cellmate described his anguish: "He is in a frenzy every Thursday afternoon, Friday morning in anticipation of execution... All his family have been told that he is already executed. But he is still inside." A woman currently awaiting execution wrote to a former cellmate: "I cannot stop asking you to help me because here they do not give us the date of execution. Early in the morning they come and take you to a big square and cut your head off. Afterwards they inform your family and your embassy. This is why I am scared."
Bucking world trends International human rights standards encourage abolition of the death penalty and set stringent criteria for its imposition and use, restricting the offences punishable by death to the most serious crimes. In Saudi Arabia, people are being executed for "crimes" such as "black magic", possession of "soft" drugs and "sexual offences" after blatantly unfair trials. [quotations] 'Madam... I ask you in the name of God and humanity... to help me because I have no one who could help me here in Saudi Arabia. My poor family has done everything they could but I believe they have lost hope... In this prison...we cannot have contact with the outside world, we cannot defend ourselves...' A letter sent in 1999 to a former cellmate from a woman currently held on murder charges and possibly under a sentence of death. 'I use a sword to kill male criminals... and firearms, specifically pistols, to kill female criminals. I think firearms are used to spare the woman, as to be executed by sword would mean uncovering her head and exposing her neck and some of her back.' Sa'id bin Abdullah bin Mabrouk al-Bishi, a Saudi Arabian executioner [end quotations] |
No excuse for executions Amnesty International totally and unconditionally opposes the death penalty everywhere on the grounds that it is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and violates the right to life. Its opposition to all executions is also based on the fact that such irreversible punishment is inflicted despite the risks of human fallibility. The risks inherent in capital cases are compounded in Saudi Arabia by the structural defects of the criminal justice system. Saudi Arabian officials claim that the use of the death penalty has been a unique deterrent to crime in their country, particularly with regard to drug offences. However, Amnesty International's statistics on executions undermine this claim as the trend is towards more executions in Saudi Arabia.
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