Five foreigners were on Monday beheaded by Saudi Arabia for murder and robbery. According to a statement by the ministry of interior, those beheaded in the Red Sea city of Jeddah were; two Yemenis, Khaled Fetini and Ibrahim Nasser; a Chadian, Hassan Omar; an Eritrean, Salem Idriss; and Abdel Wahhab Abdel Maeen from Sudan.
Monday's beheadings, an unusually number, brings to 78 the number of locals and foreigners executed in Saudi Arabia this year alone, compared to 87 for all of last year, according to AFP tallies. Deterrence was been cited as a reason for executing the punishment. The punishment for drug trafficking, rape, murder, apostasy and armed robber, under the Gulf nation’s strict version of Islamic sharia law is death.