Executions in Saudi Arabia reach all-time high of over 300 by 2024, while number of prisoners killed under MBS rises at ‘rocket speed’

Saudi Arabia will have put to death more than 300 people in 2024, according to AFP figures, after four executions announced on Tuesday pushed the kingdom’s total to a level well above the highest known annual figures.

The death penalty was carried out against three people convicted of drug smuggling and another of murder, the official Saudi Press Agency reported, citing the Interior Ministry.

It brings the total number of executions for the year to 303, according to the count based on state media reports.

The Gulf monarchy had already introduced the death penalty 200 times by the end of September, according to the same body of official data, which points to a high number of executions in recent weeks.

According to Amnesty International, Saudi Arabia executed the third highest number of prisoners in the world in 2023, after China and Iran.

Previously, the country’s record number of executions in a single year stood at 196 in 2022, said the London-based rights group, which started recording annual figures in 1990.

Taha al-Hajji, legal director of the Berlin-based European Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR), condemned the “rocket speed” of executions in 2024, calling it “incomprehensible and inexplicable.”

Human rights activists had previously warned that Saudi Arabia could carry out more than 300 executions this year, with one execution recorded almost every day.

Saudi Arabia executed the third highest number of prisoners in the world in 2023, behind China and Iran, according to Amnesty International (a man kneels moments before being beheaded in Saudi Arabia)

The kingdom has also been criticized for a crackdown on freedom of expression after Saudi artist Mohammed al-Hazza, 48, was recently sentenced to more than 20 years in prison for political cartoons that allegedly insulted the Gulf kingdom’s leadership.

Under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, The Saudi judiciary has convicted “dozens of individuals and imposed lengthy prison sentences over the past two years for their statements on social media,” human rights groups Amnesty International and ALQST said in April.

Saudi officials say the suspects committed terrorism-related crimes.

“The case of Mohammed al-Hazza is an example of the suppression of freedom of expression in Saudi Arabia, where no one has been spared, including artists,” Sanad operations manager Samer Alshumrani told AFP.

“This is supported by the politicized, non-independent judiciary in Saudi Arabia.”

Al-Hazza’s sentence came days after Saudi Arabia was denied a seat on the UN Human Rights Council in October.

The Saudi Arabian government has continued to try to present itself as a reformed country that has made progress on gender equality and human rights, despite the shocking number of executions and the crackdown on freedom of expression.

Since taking over as crown prince in 2015, Salman has overseen more than 1,450 executions and despite a mortar over the use of the death penalty for minor crimes in 2020, capital punishment cases reached a monthly record of 41 in August. .

The brutal regime has also handed out long prison sentences to several women, often in secret trials, after they were caught using social media to advocate for greater rights and freedoms for women.

One of those women, 30-year-old Manahel al-Otaibi, was sentenced to 11 years in prison for “terrorist crimes” after the Saudi Arabian fitness instructor posted messages about women’s empowerment online.

Manahel al-Otaibi, 30, was jailed for 11 years after posting about women’s empowerment on social media

Saudi Arabia has a shocking record on gender equality (File Image)

In October, Manahel told her family that she had been stabbed in the face with a sharp pen and that stitches were needed, but when her family tried to report the attack to the Saudi government’s Human Rights Commission, they were reportedly ignored.

Yet in March, Saudi Arabia was elected to chair a UN commission aimed at promoting gender equality and empowering women.

To the consternation of human rights organizations around the world, Saudi Arabia’s envoy to the UN, Abdulaziz Alwasil, was elected chair of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) in a completely unopposed race at the group’s annual meeting in New York.

He was even supported by a group of Asia-Pacific states on the commission, despite his country’s infamous record on gender equality, which human rights groups were quick to point out.

Louis Charbonneau, UN director of Human Rights Watch, said at the time: “Saudi Arabia’s election as chair of the UN Commission on the Status of Women shows a shocking disregard for women’s rights around the world.

“A country that jails women simply for standing up for their rights should not be the face of the UN’s top forum for women’s rights and gender equality.

“The Saudi authorities must demonstrate that this honor is not entirely undeserved and immediately release all detained women’s rights defenders, end male guardianship and guarantee women’s full rights to equality with men.”

Saudi lawmakers passed a law in 2022 that claims to have increased the “personal status” of women in the country.

But the law explicitly says that a woman must obtain permission from a male guardian to marry.

It also states that a wife must obey her husband in a “reasonable manner,” and that her husband’s financial support depends on her “obedience.”

A spouse can withdraw financial support for reasons such as refusing to have sex with him, live in a marital home, or travel with him without a “legitimate excuse.”