Capital punishment in Saudi Arabia

Saudi authorities put to death a convicted murderer on Sept. 3, bringing to 130 the number of executions in the kingdom so far this year, according to an AFP tally.

Saudi Arabia on Aug. 26 executed three of its citizens for murder and a Syrian convicted of drugs smuggling, a day after Amnesty International urged a moratorium on rising executions in the conservative kingdom.

Saudi Arabia has executed at least 175 people over the past 12 months, on average one person every two days, according to a report released Aug. 25 by Amnesty International.

After being sentenced to death, three convicts got publicly beheaded with a sword.

All three beheaded (a Pakistani and two Saudis) were sentenced for drug trafficking and murder.

According to the APF, the total amount of beheadings of people sentenced to death penalty since the beginning of the year reach the 48, which is much more than last year.

Jordan executed 11 men convicted of murder by hanging on Dec. 21, the interior ministry said, as it ended an informal eight-year moratorium on the death penalty.

"Eleven criminals convicted in different cases of murder were executed at dawn," the official Petra news agency quoted a ministry spokesman as saying.

Saudi Arabia on Nov. 20 beheaded a Turkish man convicted of drug trafficking, the interior ministry said, in the latest execution in the ultra-conservative Gulf kingdom.

Ali Ağırdaş had been convicted of receiving a "large amount of drugs" and was executed in the Saudi capital Riyadh, the ministry said in a statement.