Overview

• Saudi Arabia carried out 345 executions in 2024—its highest annual tally in over 30 years—and 180 more in the first half of 2025, contributing to 1,816 total since 2014
• In June 2025 alone the kingdom executed 46 people, including 37 for nonviolent drug offences
• Foreign nationals comprise about 75% of drug-related death sentences while Shia Muslims account for nearly 42% of terrorism-related executions
• Seven men who were minors at the time of their alleged offences remain at risk of execution despite reforms to protect child defendants
• Amnesty International and other rights monitors report torture-tainted confessions and the withholding of bodies from families, denying them proper burial rites