[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----worldwide

[Rick Halperin]

Oct. 14





SAUDI ARABIA:

How the kingdom treats the people it is going to execute

Prisoners who have been sentenced to death can spend years kept in communal 
cells alongside other inmates


Saudi Arabia’s justice system is notoriously brutal and the country has one of 
the highest execution rates in the world. According to research by Amnesty 
International, the conservative kingdom put to death at least 102 people in the 
first 6 months of 2015 alone. Adultery, armed robbery, apostasy, drug-related 
offences, rape, “witchcraft” and “sorcery” all carry the death penalty.

There is no “death row” in Saudi Arabia, with prisoners who have been sentenced 
to death kept in communal cells alongside other inmates. Some spend years in 
jail without knowing the date of their execution, before suddenly being 
informed 24 hours before it takes place.

According to Sevag Kechichian, Amnesty’s Saudi Arabia researcher, the decision 
on when to execute a prisoner is made “arbitrarily”, based on whether a local 
governor feels the death rate in their area should be increased, or as a 
deterrent if there has been a spike in a certain type of offence such as drug 
smuggling.

Government cancels contract with the Saudi Arabian prison system
David Cameron to write to Saudi government over Karl Andree case
British grandfather's family call on PM to save him from Saudi lashes
Saudi Arabia to punish British grandfather with 350 lashes

Prisoners awaiting execution are moved to solitary confinement and spend their 
last night alone. In 95 per cent of cases beheading is the preferred method, 
but some death sentences are also carried out by firing squad. The executions 
typically take place in the public square of a town or city, with security 
forces laying a plastic sheet on the ground before announcing what is about to 
take place and carrying out the beheading.

If the prisoner has been sentenced to death followed by crucifixion, the 
spectacle does not end here. “After the beheading, they put the head in a bag, 
tie it to the headless body and then pull the body up with a crane and suspend 
it at a high altitude,” Mr Kechichian said. “It could be there for hours…the 
logic is that it’s a deterrent for everybody passing by.”

Some wings of the country’s larger prisons have been newly renovated so they 
are clean and modern, while there is also evidence that “high profile” 
prisoners such as activists are treated relatively well, he added. Conditions 
in more remote, rural prisons are very difficult to monitor but can be 
“horrible”. For most ordinary Saudi Arabians, he said, prisons are “degrading” 
and guards have “complete impunity” to mistreat them however they like.

(source: The Independent)


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Here’s How Saudi Arabia Tried To Spin Its Executions To The World

Leaked cables show the kingdom’s PR strategy while it was engaged in a secret 
deal with Britain to be elected to the UN Human Rights Council.

Leaked cables from the Saudi foreign ministry reveal how the kingdom tried to 
manage media coverage of two beheadings in 2013 so its bid to be elected to the 
UN Human Rights council would be unaffected.

Earlier this month, the Financial Times revealed that the UK “initiated a 
secret deal” with Saudi Arabia to ensure both states were elected to the UN 
body. David Cameron later faced an uncomfortable interview with Channel 4 News 
over the deal, which host Jon Snow described as “squalid”. He defended his 
position by saying he had made it in the interests of national security.

The revelation highlights why Britain is facing mounting pressure over its key 
Middle East ally. On Tuesday, Cameron was forced to cancel a multimillion-pound 
contract to advise the kingdom over its prison policy. The prime minister also 
announced that he would write to Saudi Arabia’s rulers about an elderly British 
man who has been held in jail there for 14 months and reportedly faces 350 
lashes for carrying homemade wine.

The UK has also been criticised by civil rights groups who accuse the 
government of not adhering to a European Parliament resolution on Saudi Arabia, 
BuzzFeed News can reveal.

Saudi Arabia is facing growing international condemnation over the death 
sentences against Ali al-Nimr and Dawoud al-Marhoun, 2 juvenile protesters who 
were both arrested aged 17. Campaign groups say they were tortured in order to 
extract confessions.

The leaked cables – which were posted on the WikiLeaks site earlier this year – 
show how Saudi Arabia has managed this pressure over previous executions.

They reveal that while Britain was championing the Saudi cause in 2013, the 
kingdom was pondering the best way to defend two recent beheadings should the 
rest of the world start asking questions about them.

One of the cables discusses the execution of Eid al-Dhafiri, a Saudi citizen 
who was convicted of murder after stabbing a man to death. It was sent to the 
Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) by the kingdom’s media directorate.

It notes: “The official speaker for the French Ministry of Foreign [sic] has 
issued a statement on 15/1/2013 that states: ‘France condemns the execution by 
sword of Eid Al Dhufairi on the 13 of January in Saudi Arabia and expresses its 
concern about the continually increasing number of executions in this country.”

The cable goes on to point out that the statement “has not been published in 
any media outlet yet including the French news agency and others”.

This leaves the MOFA with two options, it says:

1. Either responding by a statement by the speaker for the Saudi Ministry of 
Foreign Affairs, while taking into account that this course of action will 
attract the attention of the media to the original French statement.

2. [This option is ticked] Or responding with an official memo handed to the 
French Ambassador via a high ranked official in the Ministry, and then later 
issuing a statement if it transpires in the media.

In the end, it seems the proposed tactic worked: There were no news reports in 
which France’s condemnation of the execution was published.

The 2nd cable, also sent to the MOFA, relates to the execution that year of a 
Sri Lankan migrant who worked as a maid, called Rizana Nafizq.

It begins:

Attached is the copy of a note from the UN Secretary General in response to 
questions regarding the execution of the Sri Lankan migrant worker in the 
Kingdom, Mrs. Rizana Nafiq, which contained that the Secretary General felt 
horrified because of the execution and worried about the reports that state the 
presence of violations regarding the detention and trial of the mentioned (Mrs. 
Nafiq), as well as the rise of the death penalty cases in Saudi Arabia.

The cable adds: “He also notes that women in Saudi Arabia do not enjoy equal 
rights to men in the eyes of the law or in terms of access to justice.” It goes 
on to add that “this issue has had intense negative coverage in the world media 
focusing on the fact that she was executed for a crime committed under the age 
of 18, in violation of international agreements ratified by the Kingdom … 
according to the … Secretary General”.

The advice offered to the MOFA is “the issuance of a statement by the relevant 
authorities that refutes these allegations so that silence is not interpreted 
as admission of guilt, especially since the Kingdom approaches the elections 
for UN Human Rights Council where this case would affect the Kingdom’s chances 
of success”.

Maya Foa, head of Reprieve’s death penalty team, told BuzzFeed News: “These 
cables demonstrate clearly that pressure from Saudi Arabia’s allies has an 
effect – the Saudi authorities are aware of the revulsion caused by gross human 
rights abuses, and are forced uncomfortably on the defensive when other 
countries protest their beheadings and floggings.”

Cameron’s decision to cancel Britain’s bid for a £5.9 million contract to 
advise the Saudi Arabian prison system was taken following a row between two 
senior cabinet ministers. Justice secretary Michael Gove was opposed to dealing 
with the regime, while foreign secretary Philip Hammond argued that cancelling 
the contract would risk the Saudis stopping sharing intelligence with the UK.

Britain is also facing criticism for not doing more to intervene in the case of 
the two young Saudi protesters who are due to be executed. Six days ago, the 
European Parliament passed a resolution calling on Saudi Arabia not to kill Ali 
al-Nimr and Dawoud al-Marhoun, along with others arrested at protests. It 
called on all member states to “deploy all their diplomatic tools and make 
every effort to immediately stop the execution”.

Maya Foa told BuzzFeed News: “The European Parliament’s resolution will have 
been heard loud and clear in the Kingdom – as will the British government’s 
11th-hour decision to cancel its misguided prisons deal.” She added: “MEPs are 
right to call on EU member states to do more to stop these executions. Britain 
in particular should be using our very strong Saudi links to save Ali and 
Dawoud – and UK ministers must also come clean about our continued activities 
within the Saudi ‘justice’ system.”

Zena al-Esia, a researcher at the European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights, 
said: “This adopted resolution which was motioned by MEPs sends a strong 
message to European member states, and acts as a clear signal to the individual 
member states to play a more influential role in the development of human 
rights in Saudi Arabia.”

However, such pleas may fall on deaf ears. Earlier this month, Sir Simon 
McDonald, permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, said human rights no 
longer had the “profile” within his department they had “in the past”.

A Foreign Office spokesperson told BuzzFeed News: “The British Government is 
very concerned about the case of Ali Mohammed Al Nimr. We have raised this, as 
we do regularly with human rights cases, with the Saudi Arabian Government at 
the highest levels. The UK opposes the death penalty around the world.”

(source: BuzzFeedNews)



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Mother of Saudi man sentenced to crucifixion begs Obama to intervene

US president urged to rescue Ali Mohammed al-Nimr, sentenced to be beheaded and 
crucified for allegedly attending anti-government protests


The mother of a Saudi protester sentenced to death by beheading and crucifixion 
has begged Barack Obama to intervene to save her son’s life.

In her first interview with foreign media, Nusra al-Ahmed, the mother of Ali 
Mohammed al-Nimr, whose case has made headlines around the world, described the 
intended punishment as savage and “backwards in the extreme”.

Human rights groups including Amnesty International and Reprieve, the US 
talkshow host Bill Maher and the British prime minister, David Cameron, have 
all weighed in with calls for clemency to stop Nimr, who was 17 at the time of 
his arrest, from being beheaded and then crucified.

The oil-rich state is facing increasing diplomatic scrutiny over the severity 
of its penal system as it takes over the chair of the UN human rights council.

Asked how she was coping knowing that at any moment her son could be put to 
death following the Saudi supreme court’s rejection of his appeal, Ahmed said: 
“For other people every hour is composed of 60 minutes, but for me every hour 
is 60 beats of pain.”

She said her son had been detained sometime after joining Shia demonstrators in 
the eastern coastal city of Qatif seeking equal religious rights in the 
Sunni-majority country.

The official charges levelled against Nimr included attending a protest, using 
his phone to encourage further support for the demonstrations and possessing a 
gun, an accusation which the family strongly denies.

“They were peaceful and civilised and legitimate and so my fear was, I was 
afraid for my son, but inside I agreed with them in principle.”

She said that before his arrest Nimr was a quick learner who loved swimming, 
football and photography, and also a devoted son. “At home when he saw me 
cooking … he would offer to help me cook, cut the onion or slice the potatoes. 
This was his temperament completely.”

Visiting after his arrest, she alleged he had been tortured. “When I visited my 
son for the first time I didn’t recognise him. I didn’t know whether this 
really was my son Ali or not. I could clearly see a wound on his forehead. 
Another wound in his nose. They disfigured it. Even his body, he was too thin.”

“[When] I started talking to him [he told me that] during the interrogation [he 
was] being kicked, slapped, of course his teeth fell out … For a month he was 
peeing blood. He said he felt like a mass of pain, his body was no more.”

She still had hope her son could be saved from his punishment imposed under 
Saudi’s sharia penal system and described the sentence – which would involve 
him being beheaded before his decapitated body is hung from a cross in public – 
as having been plucked out of the dark ages.

“I feel that one’s very being is repelled at such a ruling … It’s backwards in 
the extreme. No sane and normal human being would rule against a child of 17 
years old using such a sentence. And why? He didn’t shed any blood, he didn’t 
steal any property. Where did they get it [this sentence]? From the dark ages?”

She believes the sentence was intended to punish her son for his Shia faith. “I 
don’t expect that anyone normal and sane has heard of such a thing, [no] normal 
person who is not sectarian would find such a thing acceptable. That’s why you 
find that always it’s sectarian people who are happy with such things because 
he’s a Shia.”

Calling on the US president to intervene she said: “He is the head of this 
world and he can, he can interfere and rescue my son … To rescue someone from 
harm, there is nothing greater than that. I mean my son and I are simple people 
and we don’t carry any significance in this world but despite that, if he 
[Obama] carried out this act, I feel it would raise his esteem in the eyes of 
the world. He would be rescuing us from a great tragedy.”

On Tuesday the UK government said it would be withdrawing its bid for a £5.9m 
contract to deliver training for Saudi prisons. That move came on the same day 
that Cameron said he would write to Riyadh to implore Saudi authorities not to 
carry out a punishment of 360 lashes on a British pensioner caught transporting 
homemade wine in his car. Last week Cameron appealed to the newly crowned king 
not to carry out the death sentence on Nimr.

Speaking on BBC’s Newsnight on Friday the Saudi ambassador to the UN, Abdallah 
al-Mouallimi, said he would not talk about Nimr’s case because the “legal 
process has not been exhausted”, but said the matter was one for Saudi Arabia 
alone.

“We respectfully request the world to respect our systems and our judicial 
processes, and our laws and regulations, and not to interfere in the internal 
affairs of a sovereign state.”

Mouallimi said the kingdom would uphold the UN charter on human rights. “The 
application of sharia law as far as human rights is concerned is the highest 
form of human rights,” he said, adding: “We believe that we are holding 
ourselves to the highest standards. If that doesn’t please someone here or 
there, that’s their problem not ours.”

The Saudi UK embassy has said it rejects “any form of interference in its 
internal affairs”.

Maya Foa, head of the death penalty team at Reprieve, said the US president 
needed to step in immediately. “Saudi Arabia’s planned executions of Ali 
al-Nimr and another juvenile, Dawoud al-Marhoon, have rightly caused a global 
outcry. But the response of the US – the Saudis’ closest ally – to these 
outrages has been woefully inadequate,” she said.

“The beheading of these 2 boys, who were arrested and tortured for merely 
attending protests, would be a grotesque miscarriage of justice. President 
Obama must listen to the call from Ali’s desperate family, and step in now to 
urge the Saudis to change course.”

Nusra al-Ahmed said she was grateful for the support she had received from 
across Europe, Africa and the Middle East, and described the intervention by 
the UK’s leader of the opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, during his inaugural speech 
to his party conference as a “beautiful gesture”.

During the speech Corbyn called on Cameron to take up Nimr’s case with the 
Saudi authorities “to prevent a grave injustice”.

Ahmed said she hoped Corbyn “continues to demand or to canvass the kingdom of 
Saudi Arabia regarding this issue and this is a very humane act from him.”

Nimr’s case now rests in the hands of King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, who is 
facing dissension from within the sprawling royal family just 10 months after 
taking the throne.

Asked whether she had a message for him, Ahmed said, “I wish that King Salman 
would lift this pain from my son … The king is also a father, and he should be 
the first one to feel sympathy for us.”

(soruce: The Guardian)


IRAN----executions

22 executions including of a young woman and 3 public executions


Face to face with the international community’s commemoration of “October 10th, 
the World Day Against the Death Penalty”, the Iranian regime criminally hanged 
22 people. 17 of the prisoners were hanged on October
12.

On Tuesday, October 13, the regime’s henchmen hanged a young woman who was only 
16 when arrested after she had languished 7 years in Adelabad Prison of Shiraz. 
This cruel punishment was carried out despite calls by international human 
rights institutions to save her life.

In the morning of October 12, 3 prisoners were hanged in public in Kazeroon for 
“armed clash” with the military and security forces and “causing insecurity in 
Bushehr, as well as in Mamasani and Kazeroon counties” on the mullahs’ 
fabricated charge of “corruption on earth and enmity with God.”

On this same day, in another criminal act, 8 prisoners were collectively
hanged in Darya Prison in Urmia. Concurrently, 6 prisoners sentenced to death 
were hanged in Karaj Central Prison.

On October 10 and 11, 4 other prisoners were hanged in prisons in Rasht and 
Bandar Abbas. Mohsen Tima, a prisoner from Bandar Abbas who was arrested when 
he was 20 years old, was hanged on October 11 after suffering 15 years in the 
regime’s medieval prisons.

While the noose of infightings inside the regime, growing social discontent, 
and domestic and international crises tightens around regime’s neck, this 
regime has found no escape but to ratchet up suppression and increase the 
barbaric and arbitrary executions to save itself from its certain downfall.

The Iranian Resistance calls on all international agencies to condemn these 
barbaric executions and urges that any rapprochement with the Iranian regime be 
made contingent on the improvement of human rights in Iran, particularly the 
cessation of executions.

(source: Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran)