Saudi Arabia to execute woman for 'witchcraft'
Human rights group appeals to Saudi king to stop execution
BEIRUT, Lebanon - A leading human rights group appealed to Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah on Thursday to stop the execution of a woman accused of witchcraft and performing supernatural acts.
The New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement that the kingdom's religious police who arrested and interrogated Fawza Falih, and the judges who tried her in the northern town of Quraiyat never gave her the opportunity to prove her innocence in the face of "absurd charges that have no basis in law."
Falih's case underscores shortcomings in Saudi Arabia's Islamic legal system in which rules of evidence are shaky, lawyers are not always present and sentences often depend on the whim of judges.
The most frequent victims are women, who already suffer severe restrictions on daily life in Saudi Arabia: They cannot drive, appear before a judge without a male representative, or travel abroad without a male guardian's permission.
What's the crime?
Witchcraft is considered an offense against Islam in the conservative kingdom.
In Falih's case, the judges who convicted her in April 2006 relied on a coerced confession and on the statements of witnesses who said she had "bewitched" them, according to the group.
Falih retracted her confession in court, claiming it was extracted under duress, and said that as an illiterate woman, she did not understand the document she was forced to fingerprint.
"The fact that Saudi judges still conduct trials for unprovable crimes like 'witchcraft' underscores their inability to carry out objective criminal investigations," said Joe Stork, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
There was no immediate comment on the statement from Saudi Arabia, where government offices are closed on Thursdays, the start of the Muslim weekend.
"Fawza Falih's case is an example of how the authorities failed to comply even with existing safeguards in the Saudi justice system," he added.
The Saudi court cited an instance in which a man allegedly became impotent after being bewitched by Falih, the rights group said.
An appeals court ruled in September 2006 that Falih could not be sentenced to death for witchcraft because she had retracted her confession. But a lower court subsequently reissued the death sentence for the benefit of "public interest" and to "protect the creed, souls and property of this country," the group's statement said.
Forced divorce
Human Rights Watch's statement came a day after Yakin Erturk, the U.N. special investigator for violence against women, wrapped up a 10-day visit to Saudi Arabia during which she highlighted another controversial case that has attracted international criticism.
Ertuk met with Fatima and Mansour al-Timani, who were forcibly divorced by the wife's family on grounds she had married someone from a lesser tribe.
The couple learned of the divorce on Feb. 25, 2006, when police knocked on their door to serve Mansour the divorce papers.
At a news conference on Wednesday, Erturk said she met the wife and husband who were in a "terrible state of mind" and that Saudi officials had promised her arrangements would be made for the couple's reunion, according to Saudi newspaper Arab News.
International fury over Saudi Arabia's plans to behead woman accused of being a witch
Last updated at 22:21pm on 14th February 2008
Brutal: Saudi law punishes 'witches' by beheading them
Saudi Arabia's religious police plan to behead a woman accused of being a witch, a human rights group said yesterday.
Human Rights Watch has asked the country's king to intervene over "absurd charges that have no basis in law".
Fawza Falih was arrested and interrogated in the northern town of Quraiyat two years ago and was sentenced to death.
The judges who convicted her relied on her forced confession and the statements of witnesses who said she had "bewitched" them.
One man claimed that he became impotent after Falih cast a spell on him.
Witchcraft is considered an offence against Islam in the conservative kingdom.
Falih retracted her confession in court, saying it was extracted under duress and that she could not understand the document because she is illiterate.
The death sentence was lifted on appeal, but reimposed in the name of "public interest" shortly afterwards.
Joe Stork, the Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, said: "The fact that Saudi judges still conduct trials for unprovable crimes like 'witchcraft' underscores their inability to carry out objective criminal investigations.
"Fawza Falih's case is an example of how the authorities failed to comply even with existing safeguards in the Saudi justice system."
Saudi Arabia does not have a written penal code, although a law imposed in 2002 supposedly grants defendants the right to be tried in person and to have a lawyer present during interrogation and trial.
But this is often ignored and sentences can depend on the whim of judges.
The most frequent victims of whimsical rulings are women, who already suffer severe restrictions in their daily life.
Last year, a woman was sentenced to a public lashing after being gang-raped by five men who found her in a car with a man who was not related to her - a crime in itself.
The sentence was lifted after an international outcry.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?
http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/sinister_saudi_arabia_home_of_wahhabism/index.html
 | This story is without equal. Better yet the Saudis are defending the sentencing of the gang rape victim. Above photo is of a woman and sent to Dr. Homa Darabi 20 days after she received 50 lashes in Iran. Now imagine 200 lashes for the crime of being gang raped. |
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