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(Scroll down for video) A court in Saudi Arabia has ordered a man to be paralyzed after being convicted of assault, according to statements by human rights groups.
The London, England based group, Human Rights, said that Ali al-Khawaher, 24, was reported to have spent 10 years in jail waiting to be surgically paralyzed unless his family paid a million Saudi riyals to his alleged victim.
A local Saudi newspaper reported last week that Khawaher had stabbed a childhood friend in the spine during a dispute over 10 years ago, paralyzing him from the waist down.
Saudi Arabia applies the Islamic sharia law, which allows eye-for-eye-punishment for crimes, but allows victims to forgive those facing charges with so called blood money.
"Paralyze someone as punishment for a crime would be torture,” Ann Harrison, Amnesty International's Middle East and North Africa officer, said. "That kind of punishment that could be applied is absolutely shocking, even in Saudi Arabia,” she added.
An Arabic language newspaper quoted the 60-year-old mother of Khawaher as saying that her son was just a 14-year-old child at the time of the crime. She said the victim had asked for two million riyals to forgive her son and then reduced the request to 1 million.
"Unfortunately, we do not have even have a tenth of that amount," the mother said.
“What will the victim gain if the suspect is tortured and paralyzed. This definitely falls into the category of cruel and inhuman punishment,” Gina Kole, 41, a human rights activist in the Middle East told YourJewishNews.com.
The newspaper also said that an anonymous philanthropist was trying to raise funds to pay the price of the blood money.Mobile video not loading? Click here to view