Saudi Man Issued Death Sentence Starts Hunger Strike

A Saudi Arabian man who last week was issued a new death sentence for crimes that he committed when he was a minor has started a hunger strike in protest, according to reports. The new death sentence handed down by a criminal court comes after a mandatory retrial, ordered after a higher court overturned a previous death sentence. Abdullah al-Huwaiti was arrested at the age of 14 and sentenced to death three years later in 2019 on murder and armed robbery charges. The country’s Supreme Court overturned the first sentence reportedly over false confessions.

The Britain-based rights group Reprieve said that Huwaiti was placed in solitary confinement, and was later hospitalized after becoming ill, presumably due to the hunger strike.

Saudi King Salman in 2020 issued a royal decree that ended capital punishment for juveniles. The decree was announced at the time to apply to retroactively to all cases where an individual was sentenced to death for offenses committed under the age of 18.