Saudi Arabia sentences govt critic to demise over 5 tweets, 92 executions carried out in 2023 to date

 A Saudi Arabia court docket has sentenced a retired instructor to demise over his feedback on-line, CNN reported citing his brother in addition to the advocacy group Human Rights Watch.

The 54-year-old retired Saudi instructor, Muhammad al-Ghamdi, was sentenced “following 5 tweets criticizing corruption and human rights violations,” his brother Saeed bin Nasser al-Ghamdi tweeted final week.

According to Human Rights Watch, Muhammad al-Ghamdi was arrested final yr and given little entry to a lawyer earlier than his conviction in July “under Article 30 of Saudi Arabia’s counterterrorism law for ‘describing the King or the Crown Prince in a way that undermines religion or justice,’ article 34 for ‘supporting a terrorist ideology,’ article 43 for ‘communication with a terrorist entity,’ and article 44 for publishing false news ‘with the intention of executing a terrorist crime.’”

Saudi Arabia researcher at Human Rights Watch, Joey Shea, mentioned in an announcement on Tuesday: “Repression in Saudi Arabia has reached a terrifying new stage when a court can hand down the death penalty for nothing more than peaceful tweets.”
According to the European Saudi Organization for Human Rights, Saudi Arabia has executed not less than 92 individuals this yr to date.

In 2022, UK-based human rights group ALQST cataloged 148 executions in Saudi Arabia – greater than twice the variety of executions it recorded in 2021.

The demise sentence comes amid an “escalating crackdown” on free speech within the nation, mentioned Lina Alhathloul, ALQST head of monitoring and advocacy and sister of launched Saudi political prisoner Loujain al-Hathloul.

“They are sending a clear and sinister message – that nobody is safe, and even a tweet can get you killed,” she mentioned, as per CNN.

Al-Ghamdi’s brother Saeed, a widely known Saudi Islamic scholar and authorities critic residing in self-imposed exile within the United Kingdom, mentioned he believes the severity of the sentence is designed to punish him as effectively.

He mentioned: “The Saudi authorities asked me several times to return to Saudi Arabia, but I refused to do so. It is very probable that this death sentence against my brother is in retaliation for my activity. Otherwise, his charges wouldn’t have carried such a severe penalty.”

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