A Shocking story of a woman beheaded in a Saudi street for
killing her husband's 6yr old daughter
screams her innocence in graphic footage of
the execution uploaded to the Internet. An
executioner in Mecca, the holy city, took two
swings to hack off Layla bint Abdul Mutaleb
Bassim's head, after she was found guilty of
beating the girl and raping her with a
broomstick.
The incident has sparked outrage in the
country, but not because of the brutal
punishment meted out. Rather Saudis are up
in arms that the execution was filmed and
posted online, where the woman's family
might see it.
Now Saudi authorities have arrested someone
for filming the execution, local media reports.
But it was not clear what crime he has been
arrested for.
The video of Bassim's execution shows how
she begged for her life, protesting her
innocence right up until the executioner dealt
his first blow.
'I did not kill. There is no God but God. I did
not kill,' cries Bassim, who is dressed entirely
in black and is kneeling on the pavement
circled by police officers.
'Haram. Haram. Haram. Haram. I did not
kill ... I do not forgive you ... This is an
injustice,' she screams in the video, which
was posted online on Saturday.
The executioner, dressed in a white robe,
forces her to lie down on the ground.
'I did not,' she continues before a final
scream as the executioner swings his curved
sword into her neck. His first blow fails to
sever Bassim's head entirely and he has to
swing again before she is decapitated.
A voice then reads out her crime.
It is a traditional execution for the kingdom,
which carries out death sentences in public.
Many Twitter users protested the video being
circulated on the internet because it could be
seen by the woman’s family, but did not
object to the beheading itself.
Bassim was one of 10 people beheaded In
Saudi Arabia so far this year. Saudi Arabia
executed 87 people last year, up from 78 in
2013.
The kingdom had the third-highest number of
recorded executions in 2013, behind Iran and
Iraq, Amnesty International says.
The official Saudi Press Agency said last
week that Bassim's execution came after she
was found guilty of the rape and murder of
Kalthoum bint Abdul Rahman bin Ghulam
Gadir, her husband's daughter. 'Investigations
led to her trial which proved she was guilty,'
the interior ministry was quoted by SPA as
saying.
A United Nations special rapporteur has said
trials leading to the death penalty in Saudi
Arabia are 'grossly unfair'.
Rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and
drug trafficking are punishable by death in
the oil-rich Gulf state, which is a close ally of
Washington and a regular customer of both
American and British arms companies.
Saudi authorities identified Bassim as holding
Burmese nationality but did not specify if she
was from its Rohingya Muslim community.
The United Nations describes Rohingya as
one of the world's most persecuted
minorities.
Buddhist-majority Burma views its
population of 800,000 Rohingya as illegal
Bangladeshi immigrants and denies them
citizenship.
Burma's embassy said that without seeing
her passport, it could not confirm whether or
not she was a citizen. COMMENTS PLEASE!!
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