Saudi court said to order criminal to be surgically paralysed

Saudi Arabia applies Islamic sharia law, which allows eye-for-an-eye punishment for crimes.


Reuters April 05, 2013
Saudi judges have in the past ordered sharia punishments that include tooth extraction, flogging, eye gouging and in murder cases death. PHOTO: AFP/ FILE

DUBAI: Amnesty International has condemned a reported Saudi Arabian court ruling that a young man should be paralysed as punishment for a crime he committed 10 years ago which resulted in the victim being confined to a wheelchair.

The London-based human rights group said Ali al Khawaher, 24, was reported to have spent 10 years in jail waiting to be paralysed surgically unless his family pays $270,000 to the victim.

The Saudi Gazette newspaper reported last week that Khawaher had stabbed a childhood friend in the spine during a dispute a decade ago, paralyzing him from the waist down.

Saudi Arabia applies Islamic sharia law, which allows eye-for-an-eye punishment for crimes but allows victims to pardon convicts in exchange for so-called blood money.

"Paralysing someone as punishment for a crime would be torture," Ann Harrison, Amnesty's Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director, said in a statement late on Tuesday.

"That such a punishment might be implemented is utterly shocking, even in a context where flogging is frequently imposed as a punishment for some offences, as happens in Saudi Arabia," she added.

A government-approved Saudi human rights group did not respond to requests for comment.

The Arabic-language al Hayat daily quoted Khawaher's 60-year-old mother as saying her son was a juvenile aged 14 at the time of the offence. She said the victim had demanded 2 million riyals to pardon her son and later reduced this to 1 million. "But we don't have even a tenth of this sum," she said.

Al Hayat said an unnamed philanthropist was trying to raise funds to pay the blood money, but it was not clear how much time remained before Khawaher's sentence was to be carried out.

Amnesty said the case demonstrated the need for Saudi Arabia to review its laws to "start respecting their international obligations and remove these terrible punishments from the law".

Saudi judges have in the past ordered sharia punishments that include tooth extraction, flogging, eye gouging and - in murder cases - death.

COMMENTS (50)

I am a Khan | 10 years ago | Reply

@J T:

What barbaric medieval laws? Barbaric Laws are the modern Laws of today that side with the Criminal and Torture the Victim, got it? Put yourself in the shoes of the victim. Suppose you had been paralysed in your teenages and were paralysed for the last 10 years. Due to this no one married you, you were not able to due a job, you became a burden on your family. and your criminal got a few years say 5 years in jail. Came out of Jail, got married to a beautiful lady, did fantastic business, had kids, enjoyed life and you were disabled for the next 40 years with practically no life. How would you feel then? Would you not want your criminal to be paralysed in the same way and sufferas you did? You would then want the implementation of the divine laws which your small mind is now calling as 'barbaric'. The divine laws side with the victim and punish the criminal, the modern laws do otherwise.

Reeba | 10 years ago | Reply

Instead of paralysing the criminal, he should be asked to work and most part of his earnings should go to the victim and family. Eye for an eye keeps both parties blind.That's why I do not support Shariah laws.

VIEW MORE COMMENTS
Replying to X

Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.

For more information, please see our Comments FAQ