Saudi Arabia | Highest number of executions in decades; 3 more executions announced on Saturday, bringing the total for 2024 to 198

Saudi Arabia has carried out its highest number of executions in more than three decades after three executions announced Saturday took the 2024 figure to 198, according to an AFP tally.

The Gulf monarchy executed the third highest number of prisoners in the world after China and Iran in 2023, according to Amnesty International.

The latest tally surpassed its previous highs of 196 in 2022 and 192 in 1995, according to the London-based human rights group, which began recording the annual data in 1990.

The country's official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) announced the deaths of the three prisoners citing a statement from the interior ministry.

The 198 executions this year compare with 170 in 2023, according to tallies compiled by AFP from official media reports.

The oil-rich kingdom has faced persistent criticism over its use of the death penalty, which human rights groups have condemned as excessive and out of step with Saudi efforts to present a modern image on the international stage.

Promises reversed

Jeed Basyouni, the head of Middle East anti-death penalty advocacy for the NGO Reprieve, said the new record showed "Saudi Arabia has given up the pretence around reforms on the use of death penalty".

"Promises made in recent years haven't materialised or have even been reversed," he added.

Those put to death this year included 32 people convicted of terrorism-related offences and 52 found guilty of drug-related offences, according to the tally compiled by AFP.

The previous record of 196 executions in 2022 recorded by Amnesty International, was revealed in a letter from the Saudi human rights commission. AFP counted 147 that year.

Although figures before 1990 are unclear, the Washington Post reported that 63 people were beheaded in 1980 after the previous year's seizure by Islamist operatives of Islam's holiest place, the Grand Mosque in Mecca.

Saudi Arabia's largest mass execution was in March 2022, when 81 people were put to death in a single day.

Riyadh has previously said that the death penalty is necessary to "maintain public order" and sentences are only carried out if "the defendants have exhausted all levels of litigation".

The persistently high number of executions contradicts statements by Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who told The Atlantic in 2022 that the kingdom had eliminated the death penalty with the exception of murder cases or when an individual posed a threat to many lives.

'Sharp increase'

Basyouni said Western public pressure on Saudi Arabia had "decreased significantly in the last year" with the kingdom now feeling "free to behave anyway it wants".

Duaa Dhaini, a researcher at the Berlin-based European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights, said it was hard to discern the "real motivation" behind the increase in executions.

She said the sentences may be used to empty Saudi prisons or "send a message of intimidation and force", whether "against lawbreakers or even political opponents".

The new record number comes amid a sharp increase in death sentences carried out against drug offenders this year.

The kingdom ended a three-year moratorium on the execution of drug offenders at the end of 2022, putting 19 to death in a month.

In 2022, the United Nations said that imposing the death penalty for drug crimes "contradicts international norms and standards", calling on the Saudi authorities to "halt the implementation of death sentences for drug crimes".

In September, 31 Arab and international human rights organisations issued a joint statement condemning the "sharp increase" in executions in Saudi Arabia, against drug offenders in particular.

Source: Agence France-Presse, Staff, September 28, 2024

_____________________________________________________________________

Twitter/X | Facebook | Telegram | Contact Us

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

Alabama executes Jeremy Williams

Tennessee and Oklahoma have put inmates to death within 30 minutes of each other, and Alabama followed suit hours later as U.S. states executed three men in one day. Tennessee and Oklahoma put inmates to death within 30 minutes of each other Thursday, and Alabama followed suit hours later as U.S. states executed three men by lethal injection in one day for the first time since 2010. The Tennessee man was executed for killing a maid at a motel in 1985, and the Oklahoma man for killing his girlfriend in 2003. In Alabama, a man was put to death Thursday evening for killing a 5-year-old girl he had paid her mother to abuse.

Tennessee executes Darrell Hines

The state has spent millions of dollars over decades to execute a seriously ill man who was already incarcerated. The state of Tennessee executed death row inmate Darrell Hines Thursday morning, according to an advocacy group. No formal announcement of the execution has been issued by state leaders yet. The execution was slated for 10 a.m. Thursday at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. [DPN update] Hines was pronounced dead at 10:43 a.m. CDT. His last meal was fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, coleslaw, corn, fries, biscuits, a chicken sandwich, chocolate chip cake, and sweet tea.

Alabama Set To Carry Out Execution This Week

Alabama is preparing to execute Jeremy Williams, who pled guilty to the 2021 rape and murder of five-year-old Kamarie Holland. The execution is scheduled for Thursday (August 13) at the Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama. Williams, who is 41, requested the death penalty and waived his right to appeal, making this the first execution in Alabama this year.

Oklahoma executes Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez

Oklahoma has carried out 1 of 3 executions set for the same day in the United States in another sign of the resurgence of the death penalty in the country. Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez was pronounced dead at 10:13 a.m. on Thursday, Aug. 13, at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. He was put to death by lethal injection for the murder of his common-law wife in 2003 at their Oklahoma City home. He admitted to police he shot her twice during an argument. Cuesta-Rodriguez, 70, did not fight for his life, stunning his attorneys in July when he told the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board that he didn't want clemency. "It's time for me to pay for what I did," he said.

Tennessee set to execute Anthony Darrell Hines

Barring any last-minute interventions, the Tennessee Department of Correction will execute Anthony Darrell Hines by lethal injection at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville Thursday morning. This week, two courts had the opportunity to halt the execution: the federal court in Middle Tennessee and the U.S. Supreme Court. Gov. Bill Lee announced Tuesday he personally would not prevent the execution. “After deliberate consideration of Anthony Darrell Hines’ request for clemency, and after a thorough review of the case, I am upholding the sentence of the State of Tennessee and do not plan to intervene,” he said in a written statement. The U.S. Supreme Court has not granted a stay or reprieve.

Tennessee | The doctor who helps put prisoners to death

Dr. Mark Fowler assisted in the failed execution of a Tennessee prisoner. Physicians are meant to heal patients—why is he working in the death chamber? Mark Fowler, a physician with 25 years’ experience, stepped beneath the bright lights and approached the middle-aged man lying on a gurney. Around him, people in medical gowns prepared needles and sterile tubing. It had all the appearances of a hospital setting. Fowler had been called in to help establish an IV line through which the 57-year-old man, Tony Carruthers, would be injected with pharmaceutical drugs. The team had struggled to find a vein, so Fowler was summoned to set a central line—an intravenous catheter inserted into the major vein below the collarbone.

Iran’s War on Women: Executions, Floggings, and the Politics of Fear

The Iranian regime is increasingly using death sentences, corporal punishment, and judicial persecution against women—not only to silence dissent but also to intimidate a society demanding change. The Iranian regime has long viewed women as central to the country’s struggle for freedom—and therefore as central targets of repression. The nationwide uprising of 2022 fundamentally altered the political landscape, demonstrating that Iranian women were no longer merely participants in protest movements but among their principal organizers and symbols. Since then, the authorities have steadily intensified their campaign against women, expanding the use of executions, imprisonment, corporal punishment, and judicial intimidation.

The 'Black Widow' shakes Iran: 10 death sentences for a serial killer who killed 12 men

Kolthum Akbari, an Iranian woman widely dubbed the “Black Widow,” was convicted of serial murders of elderly men she married, often temporarily. Official accounts generally center on 11 murders (plus one attempted murder), though Akbari herself gave varying figures and investigations suggested she had many more marriages. The sentencing occurred primarily in September 2025 in Mazandaran Province, with ongoing reporting and updates into 2026. The 56- to 59-year-old killer confessed to killing at least 11 elderly men after temporarily or officially marrying them; Iranian authorities have linked her to additional marriages and possible further victims.

Arizona prosecutors seek death penalty a second time for 2 inmates

County Attorney Brad Miller said Aug. 6 that the nature of the attack and both men's past criminal records meet the strict legal bar required for execution under Arizona law. FLORENCE, Ariz. - Pinal County prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against two inmates accused of violently killing a fellow prisoner behind bars, officials announced Thursday. Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller filed a Notice of Intent to Seek the Death Penalty against Pete Van Winkle and Tracy Hampton in connection with the fatal attack on Kenneth Thompson.

Iran | Executions in Tabriz, Zanjan, Qazvin

Iranian authorities executed at least three prisoners, including two Turks, identified as Amrollah Dousti, Hojjat Khayat, and Yousef Bagheri, in Tabriz and Zanjan Central Prisons. Dousti and Khayat were executed on drug-related charges, while Bagheri was executed for “premeditated murder.” According to information received by the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights, Dousti, 40, from Bandar Abbas and a father of two, and Khayat, 51, from Tabriz and a father of three, were executed in Tabriz Central Prison on Sunday, August 9, 2026.

Death Penalty News

Search This Blog