CRUCIFIXION DES VOLEURS EN ARABIE SAOUDITE
Last-ditch plea to stop crucifixion of jewellery thief in Saudi Arabia
Human rights groups have issued last minute appeals to the Saudi authorities to stop the planned execution of a jewellery thief sentenced to be crucified later on Tuesday.
In a statement, Eric Goldstein, deputy
Middle East director of Human Rights Watch, said: "It will be outrageous
if the Saudi authorities go ahead with these executions" Photo: GETTY
12:00PM GMT 05 Mar 2013
Sarhan al-Mashayekh is one of seven men whose death sentences were confirmed
by King Abdullah on Saturday.
The other six will be shot by firing squad.
The other six will be shot by firing squad.
Mashayekh will be executed at the same time and then, to fulfil his additional
sentence, his body will be displayed to the public in a cruciform position
for three days.
The seven were convicted of armed robbery, but one of the men, in an interview
yesterday from his prison cell, claimed that the group was unarmed when they
stole jewellery from a string of shops in the southern Saudi Arabian city of
Abha in 2004 and 2005. He said that confessions to armed robbery, used as
the basis of their trial for robbery in January 2006, were beaten out of the
men.
Amnesty said that that the sentences were in any case excessive, while Human
Rights Watch added that at least two of the group were minors at the time of
the crimes, and none was over 20. "Their trial lasted only a few hours,
and they were denied any legal representation or appeal," an Amnesty
spokesman said.
"Security officers who were present at the trial warned them that if they
withdrew their 'confessions' they would be tortured again, and members of
their families, including their mothers, would be brought to prison and
tortured in front of them.
"We are urging the King to halt immediately the executions, and calling
on the the authorities to investigate the seven men's allegations that they
were tortured and otherwise ill-treated.
Saudi authorities regularly order beheadings and other forms of death sentence for rape and murder, and while armed robbery can also attract the ultimate penalty it is employed more rarely.
Crucifixion is occasionally ordered as an extra humiliation - and warning - even where the method of initial execution is beheading.
Abha is in the country's far south-west, and more conservative than other parts of the kingdom such as Jeddah. Without a written legal code, judges in Saudi Sharia courts have wide flexibility to impose verdicts and sentences.
The Washington-based Institute of Gulf Affairs, which is also campaigning against the sentences, claims that people from the south of the country are regarded as second-class citizens and regularly receive harsher punishments as a form of deterrence against unrest.
One of the seven men, Nasser al-Qahtani, used a smuggled phone to tell the Associated Press from his cell that he was only 15 at the time of the crime.
"I killed no one," he said. "I didn't have weapons while robbing the store, but the police tortured me, beat me up and threatened to assault my mother to extract confessions that I had a weapon with me while I was only 15. We don't deserve death."
He said the judge at his trial took no notice of the torture claims.
"We showed him the marks of torture and beating, but he didn't listen," he said. "I am talking to you now and my relatives are telling me that the soil is prepared for our executions tomorrow."
In a statement, Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East director of Human Rights Watch, said: "It will be outrageous if the Saudi authorities go ahead with these executions.
"It is high time for the Saudis to stop executing child offenders and start observing their obligations under international human rights law."
(telegraph.co.uk)
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Saudi authorities regularly order beheadings and other forms of death sentence for rape and murder, and while armed robbery can also attract the ultimate penalty it is employed more rarely.
Crucifixion is occasionally ordered as an extra humiliation - and warning - even where the method of initial execution is beheading.
Abha is in the country's far south-west, and more conservative than other parts of the kingdom such as Jeddah. Without a written legal code, judges in Saudi Sharia courts have wide flexibility to impose verdicts and sentences.
The Washington-based Institute of Gulf Affairs, which is also campaigning against the sentences, claims that people from the south of the country are regarded as second-class citizens and regularly receive harsher punishments as a form of deterrence against unrest.
One of the seven men, Nasser al-Qahtani, used a smuggled phone to tell the Associated Press from his cell that he was only 15 at the time of the crime.
"I killed no one," he said. "I didn't have weapons while robbing the store, but the police tortured me, beat me up and threatened to assault my mother to extract confessions that I had a weapon with me while I was only 15. We don't deserve death."
He said the judge at his trial took no notice of the torture claims.
"We showed him the marks of torture and beating, but he didn't listen," he said. "I am talking to you now and my relatives are telling me that the soil is prepared for our executions tomorrow."
In a statement, Eric Goldstein, deputy Middle East director of Human Rights Watch, said: "It will be outrageous if the Saudi authorities go ahead with these executions.
"It is high time for the Saudis to stop executing child offenders and start observing their obligations under international human rights law."
(telegraph.co.uk)
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