Authorities in Saudi Arabia have executed more than 100 foreign nationals and a total of 247 death row inmates since the beginning of 2024 to date, which belies statements by Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and de facto leader, Mohammed bin Salman, in 2022 that the kingdom has almost abolished the death penalty and is now imposed only in cases of dangerous criminals who put lives at risk, had little to do with reality.

The day before Saturday, “Musa Saleh, a Yemeni national”, was executed in Najran (south), after being convicted of drug trafficking, the Saudi official SPA news agency reported.

His execution brought to 101 the number of foreigners who have been executed in the kingdom since January 1, 2024, according to an AFP tally – “a number without historical precedent”, as a human rights organization said on Sunday.

“This is the largest number of executions of foreigners in just one year,” Taha al-Hajji, a spokesman for the Berlin-based Saudi human rights group ESOHR, told AFP.

In 2023, as in 2022, the number of executions of foreigners had risen to 34.

The foreigners executed since the beginning of the year include 21 Pakistani nationals, 20 Yemeni nationals, 14 Syrian nationals, 10 Nigerian nationals, 9 Egyptian nationals, 8 Jordanian nationals and 7 Ethiopian nationals. Nationals of Sudan, India, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Eritrea and the Philippines were also executed.

69 of the foreigners had been convicted of drug trafficking.

247 death row inmates were executed in 2024

The implementation of the death penalty by Riyadh has been repeatedly criticized by human rights organizations, which emphasize that resorting to it is too frequent and is in stark contrast to the modern and reformist image that Saudi Arabia wants to project internationally. level.

Saudi Arabia in 2023 executed the most people of almost any other state, surpassed only by two others – China and Iran -, according to Amnesty International.

In September, AFP counted a total of 198 executions in 2024 so far, the highest number in three decades. He had already surpassed the previous two tragic records, 196 executions in 2022 and 192 in 1995.

Executions have continued apace since then and by Sunday had reached 247 this year, according to the count.

Jid Bassiuni, Middle East director of Reprieve, an NGO campaigning against capital punishment, spoke of a “crisis”, with the number of executions “unprecedented in Saudi Arabia” and expected to exceed 300 this year.