Human rights groups condemn record number of executions in 2025

Saudi Arabia has broken its annual execution record for the second year in a row.

Figures from the British campaign group Reprieve show that at least 347 people have been executed this year, while the total number of executions in 2024 is 345. The organization tracks executions in Saudi Arabia and has clients on death row.

The report said it was “the bloodiest year of executions in Saudi Arabia since monitoring began.”

The latest prisoners to be executed were two Pakistani nationals convicted of drug-related offences.

Others executed this year include a journalist and two young men who were children when they were suspected of protest-related crimes. Five are women.

But under suspended sentences, the majority – about two-thirds – were convicted of non-fatal drug-related crimes, which the United Nations said were “incompatible with international norms and standards”.

More than half of them were foreigners who appeared to have been executed as part of the Saudi “war on drugs.”

Saudi authorities have yet to respond to a request from the BBC for comment on the increase in executions.

“Saudi Arabia now operates with total impunity,” said Jeed Basyouni, the probation department’s head of death penalty for the Middle East and North Africa. “It’s almost a mockery of the human rights system.”

She described torture and forced confessions as “endemic” in the Saudi criminal justice system.

Ms Bayuni called it a “cruel and arbitrary crackdown” that affected both innocent people and those on the fringes of society.

On Tuesday, Issam al-Shazly, a young Egyptian fisherman who was captured in Saudi territorial waters in 2021 and said he was forced to smuggle drugs, was executed.

Reprieve said 96 of the executions related solely to cannabis.

“It almost doesn’t matter to them who they execute, as long as they send a message to society that there is a zero-tolerance policy no matter what issue they talk about, whether it’s protest, free speech or drugs,” Ms Bayuni said.

The number of drug-related executions has surged since Saudi authorities ended an informal moratorium in late 2022, a move the United Nations human rights office called “deeply regrettable.”

Relatives of a man sentenced to death on drug charges spoke anonymously to the BBC about the “horror” they now live with.

One person told the BBC: “The only times of the week I sleep are Friday and Saturday because there are no executions on those two days.”

Inmates watched as people they had spent years behind bars with were dragged kicking and screaming to death, Probation reported.

Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, Mohammed bin Salman, became crown prince in 2017 and has profoundly transformed the country over the past few years, easing social restrictions while silencing criticism.

In an effort to diversify the economy away from oil dependence, he opened Saudi Arabia to the outside world, removing religious police from the streets and allowing women to drive.

But the country’s human rights record remains “poor”, with high numbers of executions a major problem, according to US-based Human Rights Watch. Only China and Iran have killed more people in recent years, according to human rights activists.

“Mohammed bin Salman and his authorities paid no price for carrying out these executions,” said Joy Shea, a Saudi Arabia researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Entertainment, sporting events, all of that continues without any impact, really.”

According to Probation, families of those executed are often not notified in advance, nor are their bodies handed over, nor told where they are buried.

Saudi authorities did not reveal the method of execution, but it is believed to have been beheading or execution.

In a statement to the BBC, Dr Maurice Tidball-Binz, the UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, called on Saudi Arabia to impose an immediate moratorium on executions with a view to abolition and to “fully comply with international safeguards (including effective legal aid and consular access for foreign nationals), promptly notify families, return remains without delay and publish comprehensive execution data for independent review”.

Saudi nationals executed this year include Abdullah al-Derazi and Jalal al-Labbad, both of whom were minors at the time of their arrest.

They protested in 2011 and 2012 against the government’s treatment of the Shiite Muslim minority and attended the funerals of people killed by security forces. They were found guilty of terrorism-related charges and sentenced to death in what Amnesty International said was a grossly unfair trial based on “confessions” tainted by torture. United Nations human rights experts have called for their release.

The United Nations also condemned the June execution of journalist Turki al-Jasser, who was arrested in 2018 and sentenced to death on terrorism and treason charges over his alleged writings.

“The execution of journalists is a chilling attack on freedom of expression and freedom of the press,” said UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay.

Reporters Without Borders said he was the first journalist to be executed in Saudi Arabia since Mohammed bin Salman came to power, although another journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, was murdered by Saudi agents in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018.

In December, UN experts wrote to Saudi authorities expressing concern about the 32 Egyptians and one Jordanian sentenced to death on drug charges and their “alleged lack of legal representation.” Since then, most of the group have been executed.

A relative of a man executed earlier this year said he told her people were “grabbed like goats” to be killed.

The BBC has contacted the Saudi authorities for a response to the allegations but has yet to receive a response.

But in a January 2025 letter – responding to concerns raised by the UN special rapporteur – they said Saudi Arabia “protects and upholds” human rights and its laws “prohibit and punish torture”.

“The death penalty will only be imposed in the most serious crimes and in extremely limited circumstances,” the letter states. “It will not be handed down or carried out until the judicial process at all levels of court has been completed.”