Saudi authorities put two people to death on Monday to reach 17 executions in three days, state media said, as the conservative kingdom accelerated toward a record number of executions this year.
Two Saudis were executed for “terrorist crimes,” the official Saudi Press Agency said, after 15 people, mostly foreigners, were put to death for drug offenses on Saturday and Sunday.
It is the quickest pace of capital punishment since March 2022, when 81 people were executed in a single day for terrorism-related offenses, sparking widespread condemnation. In 2016, Saudi Arabia executed 47 people in what had been the country’s largest mass execution since 1980.
Thirteen of those put to death on Saturday and Sunday were convicted of smuggling hashish, and another for smuggling cocaine.
Saudi Arabia, one of the world’s most prolific users of the death penalty, has carried out 239 executions so far this year. The conservative country is on course to outstrip last year’s 338 — the highest since public records first documented cases in the early 1990s.
An immigration form contains a warning about the death penalty for drug traffickers in Saudi Arabia in Riad, Saudi Arabia, April 18, 2015. / Credit: Karl-Josef Hildenbrand/picture alliance via Getty Images
This year’s executions include 161 for drug offenses and 136 foreigners, according to an AFP tally of official data.
Jeed Basyouni of the Reprieve rights group last week signaled a “significant rise in executions for hashish-related drug offenses, with foreign nationals making up most of these executions.”
“This is particularly concerning given the global trend toward decriminalizing the possession and use of hashish,” she told AFP.
Analysts link the spike to the kingdom’s “war on drugs” launched in 2023, with many of those first arrested now being executed following legal proceedings.
Saudi Arabia resumed executions for drug offenses at the end of 2022, after suspending the practice for around three years. It says it only carries out death sentences after defendants have exhausted all avenues of appeal, and that executions are aimed at ensuring security and deterring drugs.
The country executed 46 people in June alone, mostly foreign nationals, including 37 for drug-related crimes, which is an average of more than one drug-related execution each day, according to an Amnesty International report released last month. Last year, Saudi Arabia carried out a record 345 executions, the group said.
“We are witnessing a truly horrifying trend, with foreign nationals being put to death at a startling rate for crimes that should never carry the death penalty,” Kristine Beckerle, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement.
Activists say the continued embrace of capital punishment undermines the image of a more welcoming society that is central to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 reform agenda.
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