Ali al-Nimr’s sentence was reduced to 10 years in prison by the Specialized Criminal Court on Sunday, according to human rights group Reprieve.
His father, Mohammed al-Nimr, who attended the hearing in Riyadh, said his son, now 26, should be released in eight or nine months after more than nine years “of his youth and part of his life. childhood “in prison.
Nephew of the executed arson cleric Nimr al-Nimr, Ali al-Nimr was arrested in 2012 at the age of 17 for participating in protests calling for social and political reforms in Saudi Arabia’s bustling Qatif province. He was sentenced to death.
A court later convicted him on charges, including belonging to a terrorist cell, attacking the police with Molotov cocktails, inciting and stimulating sectarianism, according to state media.
Anyone who receives a death sentence after being convicted of crimes he committed as a minor will receive a prison sentence of no more than 10 years in a juvenile detention facility, according to a statement from the Human Rights Commission (HRC) supported by State in Time.
“My family and I are happy. I hope that all prisoners in my country and elsewhere (are) released,” his father told CNN after Sunday’s decision. However, he explained that he would have liked his son to have been acquitted by the judges “because he is really innocent”.
“His health is good, but he has been in prison for over nine years. He has spent more than seven years with the threat of execution hanging over his head every day, every hour and every minute. After the verdict, he managed to breathe. From today, he longs for freedom “, added the father.
When the royal decree was announced last April, it was hoped that it could spare several men from the country’s Shiite minority, who allegedly committed crimes as minors, from the death penalty. Ali al-Nimr is the most prominent of them – with experts from the United Nations and human rights organizations urging the Saudi authorities to overturn his death sentence.
“It is strange to talk about progress when a young man spent almost a decade on death row for participating in a peaceful demonstration, but today’s decision is clearly a positive step. Ali al-Nimr is now due to be released later this year. real change is not about some prominent cases; it means ensuring that no one is ever put to death for a child ‘crime’ again in Saudi Arabia, “said Reprieve director Maya Foa.
The organization called for the royal decree to be applied as a matter of urgency to the cases of other young people still facing the death penalty, including Abdullah al-Zaher, Dawood al-Marhoon and Mohammed al-Faraj.