RIYADH (Reuters) - An Islamic court in Saudi Arabia
has sentenced a man to death for renouncing his Muslim faith, the
English-language daily Saudi Gazette reported on Tuesday.
The man, in his 20s, posted an online video
ripping up a copy of Islam's holy book, the Koran, and hitting it with a shoe,
the newspaper reported.
Saudi Arabia, the United States' top Arab ally and
birthplace of Islam, follows the strict Wahhabi Sunni Muslim school and gives
the clergy control over its justice system.
Under the Wahhabi interpretation of Sharia Islamic law,
apostasy demands the death penalty, as do some other religious offences like
sorcery, while blasphemy and criticism of senior Muslim clerics have incurred
jail terms and corporal punishment.
Executions in Saudi
Arabia are usually carried out by public beheading.
International rights groups say the Saudi justice
system suffers from a lack of transparency and due process, that defendants are
often denied basic rights such as legal representation and that sentencing can
be arbitrary.
The Saudi
government has taken some steps to reform its judicial system but has also
defended it as fair.
Last year a court
in Jeddah sentenced Saudi liberal Raif Badawi to 1,000 lashes and 10 years in
prison for publishing criticism of the kingdom's ruling religious and political
elite and calling for reforms in Islam.
The first of 50 of
those lashes were carried out in January, but subsequent rounds of flogging
have not occurred. Officials have not publicly commented on the case, but
insiders say the lashing appears to have been quietly dropped.
