Executions in Saudi Arabia hit their highest-ever level with more than 300 in 2024

Thursday, December 05, 2024 - Saudi Arabia has put over 300 people to death in 2024, according to an AFP tally, after four executions announced on Tuesday, December 3, brought the kingdom's total to an all-high level.

The death penalty was carried out against three people convicted of drug smuggling and another for murder, the official Saudi Press Agency reported, citing the interior ministry.

It brings the total number of executions for the year to 303, according to the tally based on state media reports.

The Gulf monarchy had enacted the death penalty 200 times by the end of September, according to the same tally of official data, indicating a rapid rate of executions in recent weeks.

Saudi Arabia executed the third-highest number of prisoners in the world in 2023 after China and Iran, according to Amnesty International.

Previously the record number of executions in a single year in the country had stood at 196 in 2022, said the London-based human rights group, which began recording the annual figures in 1990.

Taha al-Hajji, legal director of the Berlin-based European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights (ESOHR), condemned the 'rocket speed' of executions in 2024, calling it 'incomprehensible and inexplicable'.

The Kingdom has also been criticised for cracking down on free speech after Saudi artist Mohammed al-Hazza, 48, was recently sentenced to more than two decades in prison over political cartoons that allegedly insulted the Gulf kingdom's leadership.

Under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi judiciary in the past two years has 'convicted and handed down lengthy prison terms on dozens of individuals for their expression on social media', human rights groups Amnesty International and ALQST said in April.

Saudi officials say the accused committed terrorism-related offences.

'The case of Mohammed al-Hazza is one example of the suppression of freedom of expression in Saudi Arabia, which has not spared anyone, including artists,' Sanad operations manager Samer Alshumrani told AFP.

'This is supported by the politicised, non-independent judiciary in Saudi Arabia.'

Al-Hazza's sentence came days after Saudi Arabia was denied a seat on the UN's Human Rights Council in October.