01 April 2009 :

a court in Damascus, Syria, sentenced three men to death after finding them guilty of murdering a "senior diplomat" from an unidentified country's embassy, a Syrian newspaper reported.
The diplomat met Amjad, 26, at a bathhouse in Damascus and agreed to pay him for sex, Syria's official al-Thawra daily. Amjad and his accomplaces tried to extort money from their victim, that they beat and gagged him when he refused to pay. He died of asphyxiation.
The three men reportedly confessed to killing the man, but said they had done so accidentally.