(Dubai, United Arab Emirates) Saudi Arabia has executed 198 people in 2024 according to an AFP count based on official media, after the death of three prisoners announced on Saturday by the official Saudi press agency, a record in over 30 years old.
Saudi Arabia is the country which executed the most prisoners in the world in 2023 after China and Iran according to the NGO Amnesty International, which has been counting executions in this rich Gulf monarchy since 1990 following a rigorous application of the Islamic law.
According to the same source, the previous record was 196 executions in 2022.
Riyadh’s application of the death penalty has been repeatedly criticized, with human rights groups considering it excessive and out of step with Saudi Arabia’s efforts to present an image internationally. modern and reformist.
Jeed Basyouni, Middle East director of Reprieve, an NGO that campaigns against the death penalty, believes that this new record shows that “Saudi Arabia has given up on pretending to reform its use of the death penalty.”
“Recent promises have either not materialized or been reversed,” he continued.
According to Mr Basyouni, Western pressure on Saudi Arabia has “reduced significantly in recent years”, with Riyadh feeling “free to behave as it wishes”.
“Strong increase”
In 2024, Saudi Arabia executed 52 people convicted of narcotics cases and 32 for terrorism, according to an AFP count based on official data.
If the figures before 1990 are not clear, the largest mass execution dates from March 2022, when 81 people were put to death in one day.
According to Riyadh, the use of the death penalty is necessary to “maintain public order” and the sentences are only applied if “the accused had exhausted all remedies”.
This still high number of executions contradicts the declarations of the crown prince and de facto leader of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, assuring the American magazine The Atlantic in 2022 that his kingdom had eliminated the death penalty, except for criminals or individuals endangering lives.
This new record for executions comes against a backdrop of an increase in death sentences in drug cases.
In September, 31 Arab and international human rights organizations jointly denounced a “sharp increase” in the executions of drug offenders, while in 2022 the United Nations called on the Saudi authorities to “put an end to the application of the death penalty in these cases.