06 December 2022 :

A human rights organization says the Saudi judiciary has sentenced six more prisoners of conscience to death, Press TV’s website reported on 5 December 2022.
Sanad human rights organization, which defends political and civil rights in Saudi Arabia, said the verdicts were passed irrespective of the international outcry and criticisms over arbitrary executions of Saudi citizens at the hands of the government.
Sanad said the death sentences were issued against Mohammed Al Tahnoon, Mustafa Abu Shaheen, Abdullah Ghazwi, Zuhair Al Samkhan, Mohammed Al Masbah and Razi al-Shayib.
According to the rights group, the fresh death sentences take the number of jailed dissidents who face imminent execution to 59.
Sanad also emphasized that the government of Saudi Arabia completely ignores international warnings in this regard and continues to arbitrarily issue death sentences against its political opponents.

10 October 2022 :

A Saudi court on 2 October 2022 sentenced three members of the Howeitat, a tribe forcibly ejected to make way for the $500 bn Neom megacity, to death for resisting displacement, a UK-based rights group has reported.
Shadli, Atallah, and Ibrahim al-Howeiti were arrested in 2020 for opposing the eviction of their tribe for the project and were handed down death sentences by Saudi Arabia's Specialised Criminal Court, according to UK-based rights group Alqst. 
Shadli al-Huweiti is the brother of Abdul Rahim al-Howeiti, a 43-year-old Tabuk resident who was shot dead by Saudi special forces in April 2020 after protesting the government's eviction orders, including in videos he regularly posted to YouTube.
The men's death sentences are only the latest in a series of extreme rulings recently handed down by Saudi courts to those who have expressed dissent.
It also comes as Howeitat tribespeople have reported an escalation in the campaign by authorities to drive them from their land for the flagship project - and now the site of the 2029 Asian Winter Games, announced this week.
Two other Howeitat members - Abdulilah al-Howeiti and Abdullah Dukhail al-Howeiti - were given 50-year prison terms and 50-year travel bans in August for supporting their family's refusal to be evicted from their homes in the kingdom's Tabuk province.
Others who have received lengthy sentences include Salma al-Shehab, a Leeds University student and mother of two, and Nourah bint Saeed al-Qahtani, a mother of five. They were given 34 years and 45 years respectively over tweets critical of the Saudi government.
Osama Khaled, a writer, translator, and computer programmer, was sentenced to 32 years over "allegations relating to the right of free speech", Alqst has said.
Adel al-Saeed, vice president of the European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights said in a series of tweets that the new death sentences reveal how the penalty is being used "in an unprecedented way to include all forms of objection to government decisions".
The use of the death penalty as a political tool to subjugate citizens shows the kingdom does not plan to reverse its use of punitive death sentences, he added.
"It also shows that [Crown Prince] Mohammed bin Salman sees the international situation and the need for energy as an appropriate environment to pass his unjust sentences at the lowest possible cost," he wrote.

23 November 2022 :

Since 10 November 2022, Saudi Arabia has executed 17 men for what were termed drug and contraband offences, with three taking place on 21 November. 
Those executed to date were four Syrians, three Pakistanis, three Jordanians, and seven Saudis. 
As executions are only confirmed after they take place, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) does not have information on how many people may be on death row in the country. 
However, Spokesperson for the OHCHR Liz Throssell said they have received reports that a Jordanian man, Hussein abo al-Kheir, may be at imminent risk. 
Ms. Throssell stressed that imposing the death penalty for drug offences is incompatible with international norms and standards.  
“We call on the Saudi authorities to adopt a formal moratorium on executions for drug-related offences, to commute death sentences for drug-related offences, and to ensure the right to a fair trial for all defendants, including those charged with such offences, in line with its international obligations,” she said. 

21 November 2022 :

A Saudi national has been sentenced to death for smuggling banned amphetamine tablets near the country’s northern border with Jordan, the Saudi Press Agency reported on 20 November 2022 citing the Ministry of Interior.
Mohammed bin Saud al-Ruwaili was found guilty of smuggling the illicit substance and sentenced on 19 November.
The sentence was classified as ta’zir under Islamic law, meaning that it was decided by a judge, as opposed to a hadd or qisas offense that has a specific punishment outlined in holy texts, and it was upheld by the Kingdom’s Court of Appeal and Supreme Court.

03 April 2022 :

The Saudi Ministry of Interior on 28 March 2022 announced in a statement the execution of an Egyptian expatriate who was sentenced to death over luring two children, kidnapping a female child, torturing and raping her.
“Islam Mohamed Mohamed Aboul Fotouh Mahmoud, of Egyptian nationality, lured two children and kidnapped, assaulted, tortured and raped a girl,” the statement of the Ministry of the Interior said.
Investigations led to accusing him of the crimes and he was referred to trial and sentenced to death, the statement added.
The sentence was upheld by the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, and a royal order was issued to execute him in Dammam, the statement said.

03 March 2022 :

A Saudi man sentenced to death for crimes reportedly committed when he was a minor, only to see the judgement overturned last year, had his death sentence reinstated on 2 March 2022, according to his family.
Abdullah al-Huwaiti was arrested in 2017 when he was only 14 and given the death penalty at 17 after being convicted on murder and armed robbery charges.
However, after Saudi Arabia's Supreme Court commuted the sentence in November last year, Huwaiti was retried by a Tabuk criminal court under qisas - a form of retributive justice that allows the family of the victim to demand a death sentence, diya (monetary compensation), or offer a pardon.
The court subsequently sentenced Huwaiti to death once again.
Huwaiti's mother announced the news of her son's reinstated death sentence on 2 March in a series of tweets and called on King Salman bin Abdulaziz and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to intervene to save Huwaiti.
Huwaiti's original trial had been marked by controversy, as the evidence used against him and how it had been obtained was questioned by human rights organisations.
After his arrest in May 2017, Huwaiti had been held incommunicado for four months and denied access to a lawyer. He was interrogated under torture, including being whipped with electrical wire and was beaten to the point that he could not walk for days, according to the rights group Reprieve.
"Abdullah al-Huwaiti has now been sentenced to death not once, but twice, by a court that knows he was 14 years old when he was arrested and tortured," said Maya Foa, director of Reprieve.
"How can this be when Saudi Arabia has claimed, so often and so vociferously, to have eliminated the death penalty for children?"
Last April, Saudi King Salman issued a royal decree ending death sentences for crimes committed as a minor, instead making the maximum sentence 10 years in a juvenile detention facility.
Still, rights groups have raised concerns about its implementation and previously warned that several youths still face the death penalty.
"The Supreme Court overturned Abdullah al-Huwaiti's conviction because of grave doubts about his guilt and evidence he was tortured into making a false confession," said Ali Adubisi, director of the European Saudi Organisation for Human Rights.
"For the court to change the ruling from Haraba to Qisas only indicates Saudi Arabia's ability to manipulate death sentences for reasons not related to justice. Minors are still threatened with execution and the judicial system in Saudi Arabia is still unable to secure fair trials."
In addition to Huwaiti, there are at least five other child defendants at risk of death sentences for childhood crimes in Saudi Arabia, according to Reprieve. This is because juvenile law only specifically protects child defendants from the death penalty if sentenced under one category of offence.

14 March 2022 :

Saudi Arabia executed 81 men on 12 March 2022, including seven Yemenis and one Syrian, for terrorism and other offenses including holding “deviant beliefs,” authorities said, in the biggest mass execution in decades.
The number dwarfed the 67 executions reported in the kingdom in all of 2021 and the 27 in 2020.
“These individuals, totaling 81, were convicted of various crimes including murdering innocent men, women and children,” the interior ministry said in a statement.
“Crimes committed by these individuals also include pledging allegiance to foreign terrorist organizations, such as ISIS (Islamic State), al Qaeda and the Houthis,” it added.
Some traveled to conflict zones to join “terrorist organizations,” the statement said.
The ministry did not say how the executions were carried out.
The men included 37 Saudi nationals who were found guilty in a single case for attempting to assassinate security officers and targeting police stations and convoys, the ministry added.
The kingdom executed 63 people in one day in 1980, a year after militants seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca, according to state media reports.
A total of 47 people, including prominent Shiite Muslim cleric Nimr al-Nimr, were executed in one day in 2016.
Rights groups have accused Saudi Arabia of enforcing restrictive laws on political and religious expression, and criticized it for using the death penalty, including for defendants arrested when they were minors.
Saudi Arabia denies accusations of human rights abuses and says it protects its national security according to its laws.
SPA, Saudi Arabia’s state news agency, said the accused were provided with the right to an attorney and were guaranteed their full rights under Saudi law during the judicial process.

03 October 2022 :

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on 2 October 2022 executed an African maid who was convicted of murdering a child.
The Saudi Ministry of Interior issued a statement confirming that the death sentence had been carried out in the Riyadh region, according to what was published on a Saudi website.
According to the details of the case the Ethiopian maid killed a twelve-year-old Saudi girl Nawal Al Bishi by stabbing her multiple times while she was sleeping.
The security statement added that the aforementioned perpetrator was arrested, and the investigation resulted in her getting convicted of committing the murder.
She was referred to the Criminal Court, which found her guilty and gave her death sentence.

15 June 2022 :

A Saudi court has upheld a death sentence against teenager Abdullah al-Huwaiti, who was convicted for crimes reportedly committed when he was a minor.
Saudi Arabia's Court of Appeal decided on 13 June 2022 to carry out the death sentence against Huwaiti, who was arrested in 2017 when he was only 14 and given the death penalty at 17 after being convicted of murder and armed robbery.
Reprieve, a UK-based legal NGO, said in a statement that the death sentence against Huwaiti, now 19, "defies United Nations experts' plea that his death sentence be reversed".
"Sentencing a child to death is an act of unbearable cruelty. Abdullah has spent his teenage years fearing he will be executed and each court ruling subjects him to more severe emotional trauma. He must be released immediately," Reprieve added.
Huwaiti's mother wrote on Twitter that her son was innocent of the charge that he killed a military man and that he had no criminal record. She replied to people on Twitter defending her son against the "injustice" and demanded that Saudi authorities arrest the real perpetrator of the crime. 
She also called on King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to intervene to save Huwaiti.
In May, United Nations legal experts urged Saudi Arabia to reverse the death sentence imposed on Huwaiti, a resident of the western region of Tabuk.
The experts called on the kingdom to "abolish the imposition of the death penalty for juveniles for all crimes, without exception" because it's "inherently cruel to execute children".
Huwaiti's original trial was marred by controversy, as the evidence used against him and how it was obtained was questioned by human rights organisations. He had an alibi putting him 200km away from the scene of the crime, according to Human Rights Watch. 
After his arrest in May 2017, Huwaiti was held incommunicado for four months and denied access to a lawyer.
He was interrogated under torture, including being whipped with electrical wire and beaten to the point that he could not walk for days, according to Reprieve.
In addition to Huwaiti, there are at least five other child defendants at risk of death sentences for childhood crimes in Saudi Arabia, Reprieve said.
Saudi Arabia's juvenile law only protects child defendants from the death penalty if sentenced under one category of offence.
Last April, King Salman issued a royal decree ending death sentences for crimes committed as a minor, instead making the maximum sentence 10 years in a juvenile detention facility.
However, rights groups have raised concerns about its implementation and previously warned that several youths still face the death penalty.

24 March 2022 :

Saudi authorities on 23 March 2022 executed a Yemeni man convicted of murdering his wife and four children in the family’s house.
The multiple murder dates back to around nine years ago when the convict, named Saleh Abdullah, killed his wife first by strangling her with a clothes hanger before slaying and beheading her with a knife in their house in the town of Sharurah, Okaz newspaper reported.
Afterwards, he did the same to his four children whose ages ranged from 11 to two years. The victims included a child from an ex-wife, the paper added.
Investigations revealed that prior to the murder, the wife had performed the Dhur (noon) prayer and went to bed for a nap only to find her husband fatally attacking her.
He later slew the children and collected the five bodies in one place before calling the police.
The convict whose age was not given attributed the killings to life pressure and did not show regret, Okaz said.
He was handed down a final death sentence, approved by a royal decree.
The man was executed on 23 March in the region of Najran in south-west Saudi Arabia, the Interior Ministry said.

21 March 2022 :

A Saudi man, convicted of slaying three of his daughters, was executed on 16 March 2022 after he was handed down a final death verdict, Saudi media reported, citing the Interior Ministry.
The man, named Bandr bin Ali Al Zahrani, had been found guilty of knifing to death his three daughters aged six, four and two.
He was apprehended and sentenced to a death in a ruling upheld by the appeals and supreme court as well as a royal decree.
Al Zahrani was executed in the Saudi region of Mecca, the ministry said.
The killings occurred in 2018 when the father went on rampage during a family dispute and slew the three children, Saudi media reported.

20 March 2022 :

Saudi Arabia on 17 March 2022 executed four men - two Saudis, two Indonesians - after being found guilty of committing murder and rape, state news agency (SPA) reported.
The Indonesians men were convicted of raping a woman after tying her up while one of the two Saudis was convicted of luring a child, raping him and strangling him to death.
The other Saudi was convicted of murdering his father and brother by hitting them on the head with a sharp object then stabbing them to death.
The Criminal Court sentenced all four men to death, and the verdict was approved by the Appeal Court and Supreme Court, the Ministry of Interior said, adding that a royal order was issued to implement the verdicts accordingly.

17 February 2022 :

Saudi Arabia’s Interior Ministry has announced the execution of Jordanian expatriate man for strangling to death a Saudi man in Jazan, southwest of the Kingdom.
According to a statement issued by the ministry, the Jordanian man, Hassan Abdul Aziz Nassar, was executed on 15 February 2022 for murdering Saudi national Hussein Jaber Salem Al Maliki by hitting him on face and strangling him to death following a fight.
The Court of Appeal issued the death penalty against him after he was found guilty of premeditated murder. The death sentence was upheld by the Supreme Court and a royal order was issued approving the execution.

11 October 2022 :

At least three young men in Saudi Arabia are at imminent risk of execution after an appeal court confirmed their sentences between June and October this year, Amnesty International said on 10 October 2022.
Following their grossly unfair trials, the organization is calling upon the Saudi authorities to commute the young men’s sentences as the world marks World Day Against the Death Penalty.
The young men at imminent risk of execution are Jalal al-Labbad, Abdullah al-Darazi and Abdullah al-Huwaiti.
In February 2022, the Saudi Human Rights Commission told Amnesty International that the country had halted executions of individuals for “crimes committed by minors” and said they had commuted all outstanding death sentences in such cases.
“Sentencing people to death for crimes that occurred when they were under the age of 18 is a clear violation of international human rights law. The Saudi Arabian authorities have promised to end the use of the death penalty in such cases, yet the brutal reality is that these young men are facing an abbreviated existence,” said Diana Semaan, Amnesty International’s Acting Deputy Director for the Middle East and North Africa.
“The King should not ratify these death sentences and should immediately halt all imminent executions and order re-trials that must be fully consistent with international fair trial standards, without recourse to the death penalty.”
Between June and October 2022, the Specialized Criminal Court (SCC) and another criminal court upheld the death sentence of three young men.
A Saudi Arabian appeal court upheld on 4 October the death sentence against Jalal al-Labbad, one of three young men in Saudi Arabia at imminent risk of execution. The trial of two others before the SCC continues as the prosecution demanded the death penalty. All five individuals were children between the ages of 14 and 18 at the time of their alleged crimes.
Four out of the five individuals are from the Shi’a minority. They have been convicted or accused of terrorism-related charges over their participation in anti-government protests or attending the funerals of those killed by security forces.

27 June 2022 :

Saudi authorities have released Murtaja Qureiris, who was once considered to be the kingdom's youngest political prisoner, a human rights group confirmed on 24 June 2022.
Qureiris who is from the country's Shia minority was arrested at the age of 13 in 2014 for allegedly taking part in demonstrations, aged 10 during the Arab Spring in 2011.
"Murtaja Qureiris, detained since 2014 when he was only 13, has been released following the expiry of his sentence," ALQST for Human Rights said on Twitter.
"Qureiris had been at risk of the death penalty and was later sentenced to eight years on charges including participating in protests at the age of 10," the London-based group added.
Amnesty International in the Gulf has said it was "happy" for Qureiris and his family.
Originally facing the death penalty, Qureiris received a 12-year prison sentence likely due to the international attention his case was receiving. His term was eventually reduced to eight, yet with time served he was now due for release.
In recent months, Saudi Arabia has released several young Shia men from prison, including Ali Al-Nimr, who was also arrested as a minor for allegedly taking part in anti-government protests. His death sentence was also commuted.
Al-Nimr is the nephew of the late Shia cleric, Nimr Al-Nimr, who was executed in 2016 which was widely condemned internationally and led to the severance of diplomatic ties between Riyadh and Tehran.
A royal decree issued in 2020 abolished the death penalty for offences committed while the accused was a minor, however human rights groups have since expressed concern that this might not be observed in practice.

07 February 2022 :

Saudi Arabia on 2 February 2022 freed Dawoud Al-Marhoon who had previously been sentenced to death for protesting while he was a minor.
Al-Marhoon was 17 when he was detained in 2012 during anti-government protests by the kingdom's Shia Muslim minority.
In 2015, he and two other minors, Ali Al-Nimr and Abdullah Al-Zaher, were handed death sentences, but these were commuted in February 2021 to ten years in prison after King Salman said the kingdom will no longer impose the death penalty on people who committed crimes as minors.
Al-Nimr, who was released last October, is the nephew of influential Shia cleric Nimr Al-Nimr, who was executed in 2016.
Al-Zaher was released in November 2021.