A Saudi court has sentenced Muhammad al-Ghamdi, a 54-year-old retired teacher to death over his tweets online, says his brother and advocacy group Human Rights Watch.
According to Human Right Watch, the tweets is allegedly related to criticisms of the Saudi royal family and a push to release a political prisoner Salman al-Awda, NYPost report.
The group, slammed the decision, and hit out at the ultra-conservative nation’s “crackdown on freedom of expression and peaceful political dissent.”
“Repression in Saudi Arabia has reached a terrifying new stage when a court can hand down the death penalty for nothing more than peaceful tweets,” Human Rights Watch Saudi Arabia researcher Joey Shea said.
“Saudi authorities have escalated their campaign against all dissent to mind-boggling levels and should reject this travesty of justice.”
The organization claimed Mr al-Ghamdi was first arrested on June 11, 2022 and was held in solitary confinement for months with no opportunity to communicate with his family, a lawyer or the outside world.
His brother, Saeed bin Nasser al-Ghamdi, a high-profile Islamic scholar and vocal critic of the Saudi regime who is based in the UK, claimed his sibling’s arrest and sentence was an attempt by authorities to exact revenge on him.
Meanwhile, court documents seen by Human Rights Watch revealed Mr al-Ghamdi had been sentenced to death on July 10 under article 30 of Saudi Arabia’s counter-terrorism law for “describing the King or the Crown Prince in a way that undermines religion or justice”, article 34 for “supporting a terrorist ideology”, article 43 for “communication with a terrorist entity” and article 44 for publishing false news “with the intention of executing a terrorist crime.”
According to the European Saudi Organization for Human Rights, Saudi Arabia has executed at least 92 people this year so far. In 2022, UK-based human rights organization ALQST cataloged 148 executions in Saudi Arabia – more than twice the number of executions it recorded in 2021.
