RIYADH (AFP) – Two brothers sentenced to death for murdering a fellow Saudi were decapitated by the sword in the city of Jeddah on Monday, the interior ministry said.
Mohammed and Selim al-Madhiribi al-Shamali were convicted of hitting Saad al-Madhiribi on the head with a hammer and then stabbing him to death in a business dispute, it said in a statement carried by the state news agency SPA.
Their beheadings took to 19 the total number of executions in the ultra-conservative kingdom so far this year, according to an AFP tally based on official reports.
Under the AFP count, at least 76 people sentenced to death were beheaded in 2011, while rights group Amnesty International put the number of executions last year at 79.
The death penalty is handed down in Saudi Arabia, which applies strict sharia (Islamic) law, for a wide range of offences including rape, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking as well as murder.
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