Saudi beheads drug dealer

Number 41 and counting.

FROM INT.IOL.CO.ZA:

Saudi beheads drug dealer

Riyadh - Saudi Arabia on Friday beheaded by the sword a man convicted of dealing drugs, the interior ministry announced.

Abdullah al-Qahtani, a Saudi, was executed in the Riyadh region after he was found "dealing and possessing drug tablets for the second time," the ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

The beheading raised to 41 the number of executions announced in the conservative Muslim kingdom in 2008. In 2007, a record 153 people were executed in Saudi Arabia, which applies a strict version of Islamic law.

Rape, murder, apostasy, armed robbery and drug trafficking can all carry the death penalty in the ultra-conservative country, where executions are usually carried out in public.