Woman Executed for Sorcery in Saudi Arabia
A Saudi woman has been executed after being charged of practicing “witchcraft and sorcery,” a representative from the Saudi Arabian interior ministry has announced.
A statement released to the state news agency has reported that said Amina bint Abdul Halim bin Salem Nasser was beheaded earlier this week in Jawf, a northern province in the country.
The woman was the second known person to be executed for witchcraft in the country in 2011, following the execution of a Sudanese man in September. The al-Hayat newspaper has reported that the woman was in her 60’s and had “tricked” people into giving her money saying that she could cure their sicknesses.
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Amnesty International has reported that it had not been notified of the woman’s case until recently, although according to the BBC she was originally arrested more than two years ago in April 2009.
According to Amnesty International, Saudi Arabia does not officially list sorcery as an offense punishable by death. However, it is believed that some of the top Islamic clerics in the country have urged all fortune-tellers and false faith healers to be put to death as they are considered a threat to Islam.
