Saudi executes Pakistani for drug trafficking

Saudi authorities beheaded a Pakistani on Thursday after sentencing him to death for drug trafficking, the interior ministry announced.

Izzat Gul had been convicted of trafficking a "large amount" of heroin, the ministry said in statement carried by the official SPA news agency, without specifying how much.

His beheading in the western port city of Jeddah raises to 46 the number of executions carried out in the desert kingdom this year, according to an Agence France Presse tally.

Human Rights Watch expressed alarm last month at a surge in executions, which saw 19 people beheaded between August 4 and 20 alone.

HRW said eight of those executed had been convicted of non-violent offences such as drug trafficking and "sorcery", and described the use of the death penalty in their cases as "particularly egregious".

Rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking are all punishable by death under Saudi Arabia's strict version of Islamic sharia law.