DUBAI, UAE – Three Saudi youths who were sentenced to death for acts they were accused of committing as minors received a 10-year prison sentence, the Saudi Human Rights Commission said .
Ali al-Nimr, Dawood al-Marhoun and Abdullah al-Zaher, youths of Saudi Arabia’s Shiite minority, were detained separately on charges of their involvement in Shiite anti-government protests for discrimination that shook the eastern province. of the country during 2011-2012.
Al-Nimr, nephew of prominent opposition cleric Shiekh Nimr al-Nimr, whose execution sparked Shiite demonstrations from Bahrain to Pakistan, was arrested in 2012 at the age of 17, according to Human Rights Watch. He was sentenced to death by the Riyadh Specialized Criminal Court, which handles terrorism trials.
Al-Marhoun was 17 and al-Zaher was 15 when they were dragged down by government repression against Shiite protests and denied access to lawyers during their long pre-trial detention, the security guard based in New York.
The court will accredit the full time, announced the Human Rights Commission of Saudi Arabia, which set the release date of the three men for 2022.
Al-Nimr’s father, Mohammed, welcomed the news on Twitter, describing the sentence change as a direct order from King Salman. The government communications office did not respond to any requests for comment.
The move comes almost a year after Saudi Arabia ordered an end to the death penalty for crimes committed by minors, with the possible exception of terrorism-related crimes. The royal decree establishes a maximum sentence of ten years in a juvenile detention center for anyone convicted of a crime committed while a minor. Order the prosecutors to review the cases and overturn the punishments to those who have already served that time.
Human rights groups that have long pressured the kingdom to abolish the death penalty, especially for crimes committed by minors, have praised the decree but have expressed concern over its implementation.
“This is great news for Ali, who has spent more than nine years on death row,” said Reprieve, a civil rights group opposed to the death penalty. “But other young people like Ali are still facing the death penalty for child ‘crimes’ in Saudi Arabia. The Royal Decree must be urgently enforced in these cases.”
The son and heir of King Salman, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, is the force behind the kingdom’s efforts to relax restrictions, modernize the country and move away from an ultra-conservative interpretation of Islamic law known as Wahhabism that many Saudis they still practice.
For a long time one of the most prolific executioners in the world, Saudi Arabia announced last month that executions fell 85% by 2020 due to legal changes stopping death sentences for nonviolent drug-related crimes. The kingdom also ordered judges to end the controversial practice of public flogging, replacing it with imprisonment, fines, or community service.