Saudi Arabia executes four men

Saudi Arabian authorities have executed two Ethiopians, a Pakistani and a Saudi. Human rights activists have condemned what they called "a campaign of death" in the conservative kingdom.

Deutsche Welle, 5 August 2015

Saudi Arabia executed on Wednesday four men convicted in different cases, bringing the number of executions carried out in the conservative kingdom so far this year to at least 100. The four executions were carried out by beheading.

Two Ethiopian expatriates were put to death in the south-western city of Jizan on charges of murdering a compatriot, according to the Saudi Arabian Interior Ministry.

A Saudi citizen was also beheaded in Jizan for shooting dead another Saudi during a quarrel, the ministry said.

Meanwhile, a Pakistani man was executed in the western city of Jeddah after he was convicted of trying to smuggle drugs into Saudi Arabia.

"Saudi authorities have been on a campaign of death this year," Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director of Human Rights Watch, said in June when the number of executions had already exceeded last year's total.

The kingdom has repeatedly rejected calls to end the death penalty, arguing that the punishment is aimed at deterring potential offenders. Human rights activists raised concerns about the fairness of trials in Saudi Arabia.

Under the country's strict Islamic sharia legal code, crimes such as murder, armed robbery, rape and drug trafficking are punishable by death.

das/jil (dpa, AFP)