Human rights group alarmed by reports of planned Saudi executions

An international human rights organization fears that Saudi Arabian officials could soon execute as many as 55 people in a single day.

Amnesty International is taking recent reports about impending executions in Saudi Arabian newspapers seriously, an official with the non-profit organization told its website on Thursday.

Citing an article in Okaz, a Saudi Arabian daily newspaper, Reuters reported Thursday that 55 people were set to be executed for “terrorist crimes.” It made no mention of an execution date.

Amnesty International believes some of the accused had unfair trials and were subject to torture. The group is asking for the death sentences of three juvenile offenders to be thrown out.

James Lynch, Amnesty’s deputy director of the Middle East and North Africa program, told the organization’s website that authorities were “clearly using the guise of counter-terrorism to settle political scores.” Some of the 55 are from Awamiya, which the BBC reports has been a stage for protests as the nation’s Shiite minority claims unfair treatment from Sunni monarchs.

The mothers of some of the activists currently imprisoned have asked the king for clemency, according to Amnesty International. They want their sons to have their convictions vacated and be publicly retried in fair trials, with neutral parties allowed to observe the proceedings.

Amnesty International is a big critic of the Saudi Arabian justice system. It believes 151 people have been executed in the country this year, which would be its highest yearly total since 1995.

That number is making Amnesty International pay close attention to these latest reports.

“Beheading or otherwise executing dozens of people in a single day would mark a dizzying descent to yet another outrageous low for Saudi Arabia,” Lynch told Amnesty’s website.

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