Select date
Bumper Year: Beheadings, Executions Reach An All-Time High in Saudi Arabia
21st Century Wire says…
In the US and Britain, not a minute passes in the news that we do not hear a righteous politician or TV anchor giving a speech about the “brutal horrors of ISIS and their awful beheadings”, and yet, we hear nothing about the medieval exploits of west’s number one ally in the region, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia’s fanatical Wahabist version of Islam is one of the most brutal versions of Sharia Law and has been running unchecked since British intelligence, with the help of Egypt, installed the House of Saud into power in the early 20th century, and even centuries before that.
If you really want to know where ISIS derives its inspiration (and finances), look no further…
This week, we learn that Saudi’s most unsavoury national pastime – chopping off hands and heads in public – has never been so prolific, with feudal henchman publicly maiming and killing its own citizens at an almost insatiable rate.
This should disturb North Americans and Europeans, and yet, you will never hear a word of condemnation in the western mainstream press. Why? Because money talks. It’s all part and parcel of the US and Britain’s “special relationship” with the Kingdom…
BIRDS OF A FEATHER: US President George W Bush and Family friend King Salman, enjoying their ‘special relationship’ (Image Source: High Times)
So far this year, Saudi Arabia has executed about 175 people – a rate of one human life every two days, according to a recent study commissioned by Amnesty International (see full story below). Some 102 were killed in the first six months of 2015. The new king is on course to break the national record set in 1995 when the government managed to off 192 of its own citizens, including children under 18 and disabled persons.
It’s fair to ask: were all of these persons killed really guilty of capital crimes? That may be a fair question to ask in the US or Europe, but no one is allowed to ask that inside Saudi Arabia for fear of ending up on the chopping block themselves.
Besides the oil, it’s always been puzzling why Euro Royals, burgeoning American fascists and neoconservatives in the US love Saudi Arabia so much. Perhaps it’s because that’s how they would rule, given half a chance…
IMAGE: Saudi Arabia’s new King, HRH Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
The Independent
Saudi Arabia has executed at least 175 people in the past year, at a rate of one every two days, according to a report by Amnesty International.
The kingdom killed 102 convicted criminals in the first six months of 2015 alone, putting it on course to beat its 1995 record number for the calendar year of 192. Those killed included children under the age of 18 at the time of the offence, and disabled people.
Amnesty, which alongside the AFP news agency keeps a record of the number of people the Saudi government kills, said the execution rate suddenly surged in August last year and continued to rise under the new King Salman from January.
According to a new 44-page report released by the charity today, at least 2,208 people have been executed in Saudi Arabia since January 1985.
Nearly half of those, 48.5 per cent, were of foreign nationals, who Amnesty said suffer disproportionately under the Saudi justice system because of a combination of xenophobic prejudice and a lack of Arabic to understand proceedings.
More than one in four – 28 per cent since 1991 – have been for drug-related offences, and death sentences were also given for other crimes not considered the “most serious” – or even illegal at all – under international standards. They include adultery, “apostasy”, witchcraft and sorcery.
Said Boumedouha, Amnesty’s acting Middle East director, said the Saudi justice system which authorised the killings was “deeply-flawed”.
He said: “The use of the death penalty is horrendous in all circumstances, and is particularly deplorable when it is arbitrarily applied after blatantly unfair trials.
“Instead of defending the country’s appalling record, the Saudi Arabian authorities should urgently establish an official moratorium on executions and implement international fair trial standards in all criminal cases.”
Beheadings in public
Saudi police take turns caning a man convicted under sharia law.
Amnesty said that Saudi Arabia carried out most of its executions in the period by beheading, although some were killed by firing squad.
Despite UN calls for the end of executions by public, many convicts were beheaded in either the public square of the town or city where they were sentenced, or in other publically-accessible spaces…
Continue this article at The Independent
READ MORE GCC NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire GCC Files
