Saudi seeks death penalty for woman activist: Campaigners

DUBAI: Saudi Arabia's public prosecutor is seeking the death penalty against five human rights activists, including, for the first time a woman, campaigners say.

The five stand accused of inciting mass protests in mainly Shiite areas of the Sunni-ruled kingdom's oil-rich Eastern Province and human rights groups charged that the execution threat was a calculated bid to stifle dissent.

It comes as Saudi Arabia takes an increasingly combative approach to international criticism of its human rights record, imposing a raft of sanctions against Canada after it spoke out earlier this month.

Female activist, Israa alghomgham, who has documented the protests in Eastern Province since they began in 2011, would be the first woman activist to face the death sentence for rights-related work.

She was arrested at her home along with her husband in December 2015, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said in separate statements this week.

"Israa al-ghomgham and four other individuals are now facing the most appalling possible punishment simply for their involvement in anti-government protests," said Samah Hadid, Amnesty International's Middle East director of campaigns. "We are urging the Saudi Arabian authorities to drop these plans immediately."

Saudi officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

HRW said Ghomgham, her husband and the three other defendants face charges that "do not resemble recognisable crimes". "Any execution is appalling, but seeking the death penalty for activists like Israa al-ghomgham, who are not even accused of violent behaviour, is monstrous," its Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitson said. Amnesty said the unprecedented call for a death sentence against Ghomgham was a clear attempt to scare other dissidents into silence.

"Sentencing Israa alghomgham to death would send a horrifying message that other activists could be targeted in the same way for their peaceful protest and human rights activism," Hadid said.

Amnesty says at least 12 other leading activists, including eight women, have been arrested in the kingdom since May -- just before the authorities ended their decades-long ban on women driving.