Amnesty International Obtains Secret Video Showing Horror of Beheading in Saudi Arabia
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 25, 2008
2:27 PM
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CONTACT: Amnesty International
AIUSA media office at
202-544-0200 x302
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Amnesty International Obtains Secret Video Showing Horror of Beheading in Saudi Arabia
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WASHINGTON, DC - April 25 - Amnesty International
has received secretly filmed grisly footage of a man being beheaded in
Saudi Arabia. The organization strongly condemns the execution and calls
for the Saudi Arabian government to adhere to the U.N. moratorium on
executions around the world.
The horrific footage shows the condemned man's public execution. He
kneels on a mat while spectators and guards watch. With one strike of the
executioner's sword, his head rolls off and his body collapses in a heap.
Amnesty International has been closely monitoring the prisoner's case, a
Jordanian citizen convicted on drug trafficking related charges; the
footage filmed on a mobile phone is consistent with AI's records.
Executions in Saudi Arabia are generally held in public. Prisoners are
usually sentenced to death following inadequate legal representation. Saudi
Arabia continues to execute prisoners despite the U.N. General Assembly's
adoption of a resolution calling for a worldwide moratorium on executions
on December 18, 2007. The beheading is counter to the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights and comes at a time when there is a clear international
trend away from the use of the death penalty.
Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, deputy director of Amnesty International's
Middle East and North Africa program, said: "As a member of the U.N. Human
Rights Council, Saudi Arabia should take a leading role in implementing the
U.N. moratorium on executions and commute all outstanding death sentences."
"Very few countries currently carry out executions, and it is
deplorable that a member state of the Human Rights Council continues to
execute people. Trials are grossly unfair with prisoners getting inadequate
or no legal representation. Foreign nationals are often not even given
adequate interpretation facilities and consequently remain ignorant of the
exact nature of the charges against them or the punishment they face."
The footage is a dire reflection of the extensive use of the death
penalty in Saudi Arabia. In defiance of the world community, Saudi Arabia
executed at least 143 people in 2007, including three women, and children.
Since January 2008, the figure has already reached 53. This morning (April
25), three more people were put to death in Saudi Arabia. All were
convicted of drug related crimes, following trials about which very little
is known. Amnesty International remains gravely concerned for the lives of
a number of prisoners at risk of imminent execution, and has issued urgent
appeals calling for the commutation of their sentences.
Note to Editors:
Amnesty International opposes the death penalty in all cases without
exception regardless of the nature of the crime, the characteristics of the
offender, or the method used by the state to kill the prisoner. The death
penalty is the ultimate denial of human rights. It is the premeditated and
cold-blooded killing of a human being by the state in the name of justice.
It violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights. It is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment.
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