Saudi beheads 2 for murder, drugs

Saudi authorities beheaded by the sword on Tuesday one of its citizens after he was found guilty of murder and a Pakistani for drug trafficking, the interior ministry said. Saudi Ahmed bin Hasan al-Shehri was found guilty of shooting and stabbing to death his compatriot Ahmed bin Mohammed al-Shehri, the ministry said in a statement carried by SPA state news agency. He was executed in the southwestern city of Abha. A Pakistani, Hayat Sayyed Alsayyed, was executed in the western city of Medina after he was convicted of smuggling drugs inside his stomach, the ministry said in a separate statement issued in Arabic. Their beheadings bring to 52 the number of people executed in Saudi Arabia so far this year, according to an AFP tally based on official reports. Rights group Amnesty International puts the number of people executed in Saudi Arabia last year at 79. The death penalty applies to a wide range of offences including rape, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking, as well as murder, as stipulated by Islamic sharia law.