Indicators are escalating, raising concerns about the lives of death row inmates in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia at the outset of 2024. Despite the government's attempts to impose silence and prevent news from emerging, information has reached the European Saudi Organization for Human Rights, sparking fears of potential executions for individuals sentenced in political cases, including minors.
Information has reported strange activities within the General Investigations Prison in Dammam. This prison houses most of the death row inmates, convicted of charges that are not deemed the most serious, and the organization is monitoring their cases. Additionally, there are reports of the filming of one of the minors threatened with death by the prison administration.
The Saudi government does not publicly disclose the measures it takes; however, based on the organization's monitoring of previous cases and executions, including mass executions, those sentenced to death undergo a series of procedures days or weeks before the execution. Among these procedures:
- Profile photograph of their face
- Medical examinations
- Fingerprinting, and signing documents.
The Saudi government's handling of the death penalty file lacks transparency, and families are not provided with up-to-date information on cases, making it impossible to track their legal progress. Despite the Public Prosecutor's long-standing demand for the death penalty for detainees, a death sentence was issued for tweeting within one month for one detainee. Additionally, the Appeals Court approved sentences months after their issuance, and tracking decisions from the Supreme Court is challenging.
In addition, Saudi Arabia carries out executions secretly without informing families of the scheduled date and denying them the right to bid farewell. Consequently, the exact timing of the execution is unknown. However, current indicators, coupled with the high number of executions in 2023, raise serious concerns about the possibility of imminent executions.
ESOHR indicates that the actual number of individuals facing the death penalty in Saudi Arabia cannot be determined. However, it has tracked 66 cases where detainees are facing execution at various stages of the legal process. Among the detainees, 9 are minors, with at least 2 of them having final sentences approved by the Supreme Court.
ESOHR believes that the secrecy surrounding the Saudi government's use of the death penalty, along with intimidating families to prevent them from speaking about the conditions of their loved ones, is an attempt to hinder any form of defense for those threatened. It also aims to prevent the disclosure of details of the serious violations they are subjected to.
The organization considers that the procrastination and the failure to overturn arbitrary death sentences, along with Saudi Arabia's insistence in its responses to United Nations messages on denying information and facts about the violations, confirm that the lives of the detainees are constantly at risk.